Until Dawn (film)

Until Dawn is a 2023 American mystery, horror-suspense film directed by Darren Aronofsky and written by Larry Fessenden and Graham Reznick, who produced it with Jeffrey Levy-Hinte and Jon Kilik, stars an ensemble cast that includes Remi Malek, Hayden Panettiere, Noah Fleiss, Galadriel Stineman, Nicole Sakura, Bratt Dalton, Mahegan Martin and Ella Letini, as a group of young adults who have to survive the strange supernatural events of Blackwood Pines. The film also stars Jenny Slate and Aaron Lazar in supporting roles.

It is based on an original story by Fessenden and Reznick influenced by contemporary slasher films. Ideas for the film began in 1999, when the premise was conceived by Fessenden's treatments during his work on Wendigo (2001), with the intention of releasing it sometime in 2004, seeking collaborators for early concepts, Reznick contacted him and they wrote an initial script. There was a drafting process caused delays in the project which then went into development hell. Preproduction began in 2020, when A24 agreed to plans to take the project on a creative self-funding basis. The filming process was taken as separate films, but it was carried out back to back. Production for Until Dawn began in Simi Valley, California on February 1, 2021 and wrapped on November 15.

Until Dawn premiered at South by Southwest on March 10, 2023, and began a limited theatrical release in the United States on March 27, 2023, before a wide release by Manhattan-based A24 on March 31. The film was widely acclaimed for its script, direction, acting, visual effects, costume design, action sequences, musical score, and editing, but was criticized for its lack of originality. It grossed over $370 million worldwide, surpassing A24's previous best-ever grossing film, Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022).

Premise
Eight young adults are forced to survive until dawn after forming a meeting at the private Blackwood Mountain resort unaware that dark forces are lurking.

Cast
A mysterious and complex film enthusiast. Though considerate, caring, and complex, he suffers from depression and psychosis after struggling to cope with the disappearance of his sisters. Also, Ella Lentini plays the twins Hannah and Beth Washington. Writer Larry Fessenden stars as Jack Fiddler, a mysterious hermit who follows the group from the shadowsn and Peter Stormare plays Alan Hill, a semi-narrator.
 * Remi Malek as Josh Washintong:
 * Hayden Panettiere as Sam Giddings: A pacifist who loves nature, her friends, and is happy acting as the group's mediator.
 * Noah Fleiss as Chris Hartley: A methodical and analytical nerd with a tendency to clown around and pull pranks. He has a cursh with Ashley.
 * Galadriel Stineman as Ashley Brown: A curious academic girl with a great imagination who loves books and scares quite easily. She has a mutual crush on Chris, she is impulsive and observant.
 * Nichole Sakura as Emily Davis: A brash and driven fashion lover who uses her smarts to adamantly get her way.
 * Jordan Fisher as Matt Taylor: A motivated, gentle - yet fiercely protective - young sportsman.
 * Brett Dalton as Mike Munroe: A popular, driven young man who is a fan of women, attention, and taking matters into his own hands.

Music
The musical score was composed by Michelle DiBucci, who had previously worked with Fessenden on Wendigo. DiBucci said, "I think the whole image is a spiritual representation of what the movie is about." It took DiBucci four years to compose the score, from the film's initial announcement in 2019, which includes more than a hundred music tracks. The soundtrack album consists of 49 tracks and runs for over three hours. Two songs, "In The Cave" and "Blackwood" were released as singles on March 15 and 27, 2023. The album was released on March 25 to positive critical response.

The film features multiple instances, both in audio and dialogue, of the Melanie Martinez song "Milk of the Siren" released alongside her delux edition-studio album Portals in March 2023. When the director contacted the singer about her involvement in the film, Martinez enthusiastically agreed to lend some of her album tracks to the studio, and enthusiastically agreed to record three alternate versions of the song for use in the film. The song also appears in the end credits of the film.

Marketing
Until Dawn had a higher-than-average marketing effort for A24, spending approximately $79 million on impressions and advertisements for the film and was rated as one of the reasons for his initial financial success. This included unique trailers, unconventional billboards and an extensive social media presence. A first trailer was released in November 2022, which preceded a December campaign with new images, a short film and posters, with move to partner with companies like People, JoBlo.com, Fandango and Mashable ahead of the release of a new trailer on Christmas Day. A 30-second commercial for the film was aired during the US football championship Super Bowl LVII on February 12, 2023. The trailer racked up 31.1 million views across all social media. The magazine Box Office said the film's trailer was well received online and was frequently featured in trailers for all the notable blockbusters. Writing: "The horror genre has also shown a knack for exceeding expectations at the box office in recent years in the era of the pandemic, setting up this release for a potential midsize hit." The social reach of the film during the opening weekend of March 27, amounted to 244.1 million interactions on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram and TikTok.

Emma Gray Ellis of Wired.com described the campaign as "crazy and relentless for an arty horror film" waging a "marketing siege for teen and young adult ages 25 and up." Bobby Anhalt at Screen Rant called it arguably "one of the best movie marketing campaigns in horror movie history propelling the studio into a more expansive market" and a "major media and public victory for A24 and everyone involved".

Theatrical
The world premiere was at the South by Southwest film festival on March 3, 2023. Its limited release in theaters was on March 27, 2023, and its nationwide release was on March 31, in the United States by A24. This was followed by staggered releases in a further 49 markets through May 17. On April 14, 2023, the film was released in select IMAX theaters in the U.S. due to its popularity and had additional re-expansions on September 1, 2023 and January 26, 2024. Despite being blocked in China during this initial release, Until Dawn was finally released in the country during the 2023 Beijing International Film Festival.

Home media
The film was released on digital streaming platforms on July 12, 2023, and was released on Blu-ray, DVD, and Ultra HD Blu-ray on August 23, 2023, by Lionsgate Home Entertainment.

Box office
Until Dawn has grossed $217.5 million in the United States and Canada and $152.4 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $369.9 million, against a production budget of $100 million. It is the highest grossing film distributed by A24, and the first to cross the $100 million and $200 million mark at the domestic box office.

In the United States and Canada, the film earned $2.5 million from 48 venues in its opening weekend, a record for A24. In its second weekend, the film received a wide expansion to 2.809 theaters, grossed $32.4 million finishing second at the box office. The overperformance was attributed to the film's positive reviews and marketing, with advance ticket sales on Fandango outpacing in a 105% compared to Hereditary (2018). In its third weekend, the film made $21.7 million, dropping 32% and finishing third at the box office. In its fourth weekend, received an IMAX 3D release following its successful run up to that point, adding $17.1 million (a drop of -21%). On April 11, it crossed the $80.1 million, surpassing Everything Everywhere All At Once ($77 million) as A24's highest-grossing film domestically. The film crossed the $100 million mark on April 23 and the $200 million mark on July 16. It remained in the box office top ten until its sixteenth weekend, which ended on July 9 and ended its theatrical run on August 13.

Internationally, it became A24's highest-grossing film in every market it was released in. It crossed the $100 million mark on June 29, 2023. The top-grossing territories were the United Kingdom ($24.4 million), France ($19.3 million), Australia ($17.5 million), South Korea ($14.8 million), Mexico ($13.8 million), Germany ($9.6 million) and the Netherlands ($3.1 million).

Critical response
Until Dawn received universal acclaim from film critics and worldwide audiences. On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 99% based on 419 reviews, with an average rating of 9.1/10. The website's consensus reads, "Even with concepts already seen, Until Dawn is a spectacle of suspense and drama calibrated to the maximum." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 91 out of 100, based on 65 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". Audiences polled by PostTrak gave it an 94% positive score, with 81% saying that they would definitely recommend it and received a CinemaScore of A+, on a scale from A+ to F-.

David Ehrlich of IndieWire called the film a "drama of slapped genius", praising the direction, performances and setting, calling it an "incredible acting score". The Hollywood Reporter 's David Rooney called it a "frenetically plotted serve of stoner heaven [that] is insanely imaginative and often a lot of fun", complimenting the cast and score but found the handling of the story's underlying theme underwhelming. In her review for RogerEbert.com, Marya E. Gates lauded Maleks' performance, writing, "Malek as an anchor of the film, given a role that showcases his wide range of talents, from a pleasant beginning to a cynical and lugubrious presentation, with his ability to excavate infinite depths of rich human emotions, often with just a look or a reaction." For The A.V. Club, A.A. Dowd gave the film an A−, stating that, "In its seriousness and hair-raising craftsmanship, Until Dawn belongs to a proud genre lineage, a legacy that stretches back to the towering touchstones of American horror, unholy prestige-zeitgeist classics like The Exorcist and Rosemary's Baby. Remarkably, it's a first feature, the auspicious debut of writer-director Ari Aster, whose acclaimed, disturbing short films were all leading, like a tunnel into the underworld, to this bleak vision." Common Sense Media gave the film four out of five stars and advised that it was suitable for viewers aged 17 or older.

Dissenting reviews include that of Richard Brody for The New Yorker, who dismissed it as a "sickly cynical feature-length directorial pitch reel for a Marvel movie", and that of Peter Bradshaw for The Guardian who described it as "a formless splurge of Nothing Nowhere Over a Long Period of Time". The New York Times named the character Jobu Tupaki, played by Hsu, one of the 93 Most Stylish "People" of 2022.