A Christmas thriller? Stranger things have happened

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This article was published 20/11/2021 (1775 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Hallmark it ain’t.

Universal Pictures will be producing a Christmas-themed movie titled Violent Night to be filmed in Manitoba commencing in January through March. According to a report in SlashFilm, the film will star David Harbour of the Netflix series Stranger Things, the 2019 Hellboy reboot and the recent Marvel movie Black Widow, in which he played Red Guardian, Scarlett Johansson’s “father” within a Russian deep-cover family unit.

Violent Night, which has been described as “an elevated thriller set against the Christmas holiday backdrop,” comes from the people who gave us Universal’s hit action movie Nobody, starring Bob Odenkirk. That Winnipeg-lensed film, budgeted at US$15 million when it shot in late 2019, turned a tidy profit against the odds in its pandemic release in March, scoring more than US$55 million at the box office worldwide.

Like Nobody, Violent Night will be produced by John Wick co-director David Leitch with Kelly McCormick, whose shared credits also include the kickass Charlize Theron action film Atomic Blonde, as well as Deadpool 2 and Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs and Shaw. The script is by Sonic the Hedgehog scribes Pat Casey and Josh Miller.

Where Nobody was directed by Russian filmmaker Ilya Naishuller, Violent Night will reportedly be helmed by Norwegian director Tommy Wirkola, who demonstrated an ability to work in a cold climate with his zombie cult hits Dead Snow and Dead Snow 2: Red Vs. Dead. Wirkola also helmed the 2013 supernatural thriller Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters.

The film will certainly stand in high contrast to the usual made-in-Manitoba Christmas movies, such as the Hallmark film A Kiss Before Christmas, which is set to première Nov. 21 on the W Network with Desperate Housewives stars Teri Hatcher and James Denton.

Gary Yates’s ‘Tis the Season to be Merry, starring Rachael Leigh (She’s All That) Cook, wrapped production earlier this month and is set to air Dec. 19.

The province is currently hosting several productions, including the comedy Champions (a remake of a 2018 Spanish film), reuniting Kingpin’s Woody Harrelson and director Bobby Farrelly, and Bed Rest, a horror thriller starring In the Heights’ Melissa Barrera, for writer-director Lori Evans Taylor, making her directorial debut.

Earlier this week, the New West Hotel on Main Street, wrapped in a massive black-and-white, multi-image mural, caught Harrelson’s attention. The actor posted an image of the building on Instagram with the comment “Art in an unexpected place.” The mural, titled En Masse, was a multi-artist collaboration several years ago.

The industry is remarkably busy considering the time of year, says Winnipeg film and cultural affairs liaison Kenny Boyce.

“At this time of year, film production usually slows down, but Winnipeg has become a destination for so many international productions, crews will be working through the start of the year,” Boyce said.

“And soon, they’ll be breaking ground on Big Sky’s new soundstage,” Boyce said of the large nine-acre, 137,000-square-foot property occupying the former Nygard International facility at 1771 Inkster Blvd. “So it’s only going to get busier.”