Abruptio Debuts In Brazil With Plans To Tour The World

A horror movie made entirely with puppets doesn’t sound like an easy thing to pull off. Audiences have been conditioned to see puppets as either comedic or for children. Filmmaker Evan Marlowe decided to break that mold and create something wildly different with Abruptio, the slasher flick that will play in festivals around the world over the next few months.

It’s all in the presentation. Marlowe’s puppets are quite different in appearance than the traditional felt and plastic creations that define the genre. They’re made to look as realistic as possible and approach the Uncanny Valley (likely intentionally). Though the film will have some comedic moments, it’s mostly a serious thriller, presented in a manner no one’s seen before.

The center character of Abruptio is Les Hackel, a balding man who feels stuck in life. He works a dead-end job by day, lives with his nagging mother by night, and fails in his date life in between. Things are about to change for him, though probably not in a manner he’d want: he wakes up one morning to find a bomb planted in the back of his neck. He then receives remote instructions to begin assassinating targets, or else he will explode. Les has no choice but to obey the voices, but in the meantime, he’s determined to get to the bottom of the mystery behind them.

Abruptio stars the voices of James Marsters (“Buffy the Vampire Slayer”), Hana Mae Lee (Pitch Perfect), Jordan Peele (Nope), Christopher McDonald (The Faculty), Robert Englund (A Nightmare on Elm Street), Darren Darnborough (“True Blood”), Rich Fulcher (“Rick and Morty”) and the late Sid Haig (House of 1000 Corpses). At the moment there’s no way to see it beyond a film festival, but if that changes we’ll let you know.