The new genre studio Welcome Villain Films have announced that they’ve acquired the distribution rights to the Chilean found footage horror film Invoking Yell, which has been getting a lot of positive attention while making the festival rounds.
Directed by Patricio Valladares, who also wrote the screenplay with Barry Keating, Invoking Yell is set in Chile in 1997. The film is said to be a love letter to black metal that follows a trio of metalhead twenty-something girls who venture into the woods to shoot the demo tape for their black metal band, Invoking Yell. However, things take a sinister turn as they document their disturbing and unorthodox process of recording paranormal phenomena to be used in the album’s final track.
María Jesús Marcone, Macarena Carrere, and Andrea Ozuljevich play those three metalheads.
Valladares provided the following statement: “This film was always meant to be an ode to the found footage films of the 90’s, but with a black metal twist. I’m a big fan of The Blair Witch Project and many other found footage films from that era, and I am also a metalhead, so the subject matter came easy to me. I was lucky enough to shoot the film in my home country of Chile, taking advantage of the region’s natural splendor while also giving audiences a unique perspective into our local music scene that will feel both familiar and new to metalheads and music fans alike. It is incredibly exciting to be teaming up with the amazing group at Welcome Villain to release this special film to the world. We couldn’t be happier with this partnership.“
Welcome Villain’s Luke LaBeau added: “We are massive fans of the found footage subgenre, and what Patricio and team created is a genuinely unnerving nightmare that stuck with us long after the credits rolled. This is the type of exciting creative vision that not only breathes new life into the subgenre but also proves there are still plenty of terrifying stories to be told in the found footage style.“
And Welcome Villain’s Eric Kleifeld had this to say: “Invoking Yell brought back that feeling of seeing films like The Blair Witch Project for the first time – the mystery, the unpredictable plot twists, and the overall raw, gritty aesthetic really make this film effective and creepy in surprising new ways, and we are exceedingly proud to be releasing the film under the Welcome Villain label.“
Welcome Villain Films will be handling the U.S. release of Invoking Yell themselves and are also handling the international distribution sales for the film. A release date has not yet been announced.
I’m not generally a found footage fan, but I’m open to giving Invoking Yell a chance. Does this movie sound interesting to you? Let us know by leaving a comment below – and while you’re scrolling down, check out these images from the film: