Toxins take the form of adorable demons in trailer for The Cleanse

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

After attending a spiritual retreat, a heartbroken man (Johnny Galecki) discovers that the course releases more than everyday toxins and traumatic experiences, but actually births a literal incarnation of their own personal pain in the form of an adorable, yet still grotesque, demon. That's not something you see everyday. While speaking with Entertainment Weekly, Galecki compared THE CLEANSE to GREMLINS, THE BROOD, ROSEMARY'S BABY, and the films of John Carpenter, all while praising it as "fun and fantastical" and unlike anything he had read before.

"The Cleanse is about a group of people who are unhappy in their lives," Galecki added. "They go on one of these kind of trendy retreats that are quite the fad now, not really knowing what to expect, and not really knowing what they hope to be the result, but they want, and probably need, change in their lives. And so, they are given a cleanse on their first day, at this retreat, and what the cleanse does is expels all the toxins from your body. What they don’t know, and what they soon learn, is that those toxins form into your own personal demon, your own personal pain in an embodied form — literally." In addition to Galecki, THE CLEANSE also stars Anna Friel, Oliver Platt, Anjelica Huston, Kyle Gallner, and Kevin J. O'Connor

THE CLEANSE will be released to theaters and On Demand on May 4, 2018.