Vincent Cassel and David Cronenberg are getting the band back together for The Shrouds, a disturbing meditation about grief, making peace with death, and watching your loved ones decompose in real time. Yeah, you heard me. The Shrouds teaser trailer offers a brief glimpse at Cronenberg’s next mind-bending thriller and the filmmaker’s first project with Cassel since teaming up for Eastern Promises and A Dangerous Method. According to Cronenberg, The Shrouds is a personal project for him, with parts of the story being autobiographical.
In The Shrouds, Vincent Cassell takes on the role of Karsh, “an innovative businessman and grieving widower, who builds a novel device to connect with the dead inside a burial shroud. This burial tool installed at his own state-of-the-art though controversial cemetery allows him and his clients to watch their specific departed loved one decompose in real time. Karsh’s revolutionary business is on the verge of breaking into the international mainstream when several graves within his cemetery are vandalized and nearly destroyed, including that of his wife. While he struggles to uncover a clear motive for the attack, the mystery of who wrought this havoc, and why, drive him to reevaluate his business, marriage and fidelity to his late wife’s memory, as well as push him to new beginnings.”
Diane Kruger (National Treasure, Inglorious Basterds, In the Fade), Guy Pearce (Memento, The Hurt Locker), Sandrine Holt (Homeland, House of Cards), Al Sapienza (The Sopranos, Reacher), Elizabeth Saunders (From, Mary Kills People), and Jennifer Dale (Coroner, Into Invisible Light) join the cast as primary players.
In The Shrouds teaser trailer, Cassel’s Karsh contemplates the art of seduction alongside Diane Kruger’s Becca. After Karsh discovers his cemetery is vandalized and the party responsible could be tracking him, he takes a mysterious black suit out of storage. A montage of quick cuts from the film follows, with Cassel and Karsh sharing knowing glances as Karsh contemplates his next move.
My mom told me David Cronenberg is like a box of chocolates; you never know what you’re going to get. That’s precisely how I feel about The Shrouds teaser trailer. How about you? In the comments section below, let us know what you think about David Cronenberg’s latest film.