After playing a powerful witch in the MCU for the past few years, Elizabeth Olsen is set to don a pair of fangs as a mysterious vampire in Flesh of the Gods.
Fans had been waiting for news on Panos Cosmatos' next project since 2018's surreal masterpiece, Mandy, and last year, we got word that the filmmaker has enlisted a couple of A-list stars for what sounds like an intriguing horror thriller.
Kristen Stewart (Twilight, Love Lies Bleeding) and Oscar Isaac (Moon Knight, Star Wars: The Force Awakens) are to play the leads in the movie, which is decribed as a vampire thriller set in Los Angeles "during the glittering 1980s," and Deadline reports that Olsen will be joining them.
The story outline reads: "Raoul and Alex, a married couple in glittering ’80s L.A. who descend each evening from their luxury skyscraper condo and head into an electric nighttime realm. When they cross paths with the mysterious and enigmatic Nameless (Olsen) and her hard-partying cabal, Raoul and Alex are seduced into a glamorous, surrealistic world of hedonism, thrills, and violence."
Adam McKay will produce along with Betsy Koch via the duo’s Hyperobject Industries production company. Isaac is also producing with his partner Gena Konstantinakos via their banner Mad Gene Media. Se7en screenwriter Kevin Walker is penning the script.
“Like Los Angeles itself, Flesh of the Gods inhabits the liminal realm between fantasy and nightmare,” said Cosmatos in a statement when the project was announced. “Both propulsive and hypnotic, Flesh will take you on a hot rod joy ride deep into the glittering heart of hell.”
"We think it’s wildly commercial and wildly artful,” added McKay. “Our ambitions are to make a movie that ripples through popular culture, fashion, music and film.”
This movie marks the third collaboration between Cosmatos and XYZ, who also have Nekrokosm in development with A24.
Olsen is expected to return to the MCU as Wanda Maximoff/The Scarlet Witch at some point (Avengers: Secret Wars, most likely), and also has a number of other projects in the pipeline, including the David Freyne-directed comedic romance Eternity, conspiracy thriller Panic Carefully, and FX's supernatural(?) drama series Seven Sisters.
What do you make of this casting news? Have you seen any of Cosmatos' earlier work? Drop us a comment in the usual place, and have a look at the trailer and synopsis for Mandy below.
"In the Pacific Northwest in 1983, outsiders Red Miller and Mandy Bloom lead a loving and peaceful existence. When their pine-scented haven is savagely destroyed by a cult led by the sadistic Jeremiah Sand, Red is catapulted into a phantasmagoric journey filled with bloody vengeance and laced with deadly fire."