Throughout 2014, we reported bits of news on a project originally announced with the title VALENCIA, but which was soon retitled THE CELLAR. Dan Trachtenberg signed on to direct the film for Paramount and JJ Abrams' production company Bad Robot, and the concept and the cast hired to bring it to life instantly caught my attention.
The story, written by Josh Campbell, Matt Stuecken, and Damien Chazelle:
The majority of the movie takes place in an underground cellar, and revolves around a young woman who wakes up in the cellar after a severe car accident and fears she has been abducted. Her captor, a doomsday prepper, tells her he saved her life and that there has been a terrible chemical attack that has left the outside uninhabitable. She does not know what to believe and as tensions rise, she decides she must escape, regardless of the terrors that await outside.
John Goodman was cast the doomsday prepper and Mary Elizabeth Winstead as his captive, with John Gallagher Jr. in an unspecified role.
A trailer for THE CELLAR is attached to this weekend's release of Michael Bay's 13 HOURS: THE SECRET SOLDIERS OF BENGHAZI, but when the trailer draws to an end, it becomes clear that Trachtenberg and Abrams have pulled a fast one on us. This isn't just a standalone thriller. This is what Abrams calls a "blood relative" to his 2008, Matt Reeves-directed found footage creature feature CLOVERFIELD, and the title isn't VALENCIA or THE CELLAR, it's 10 CLOVERFIELD LANE.
It is very impressive that they were able to keep the CLOVERFIELD connection under wraps until the trailer debut, which comes less than two months before the scheduled release date.
I could never really get into CLOVERFIELD myself, but 10 CLOVERFIELD LANE stills holds my interest through the fact that it remains a claustrophic – at least up to a point – thriller starring Goodman and Winstead. I can't wait to see them torment each other on the screen.
10 CLOVERFIELD LANE reaches theatres on March 11, 2016.