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A hallucinatory new trailer for the Flying Lotus-directed science fiction thriller “Ash” has landed on the internet, and it appears to be a work of extraordinary originality and a sumptuous feast of nightmarish visuals.
Independent sci-fi films are the life’s blood of the popular cinematic genre going way back to tantalizing little gems like “Dark Star,” “Hardware,” and “Donnie Darko,” and on to more recent offerings like “Moon,” “Primer,” and “Aniara.”
“Ash” adds to those influential Hollywood titles with DNA forged from disturbing material familiar to fans of the “Dead Space,” “Doom,” or “Resident Evil” video game franchises. The plot centers on a disoriented astronaut suffering from amnesia who discovers that her entire space station crew has been murdered. She and a rescue astronaut must enter a precarious relationship of survival on a hostile exoplanet named Ash under extreme circumstances of physical and psychological torment.
“Ash” heralds from the folks at RLJR Films and AMC’s horror streaming service, Shudder, and stars “Breaking Bad’s” Aaron Paul as Brion and “Baby Driver’s” Eiza González as Riya. The cast also includes Iko Uwais, Kate Elliott, Beulah Koale, and Flying Lotus, who additionally serves as the film’s composer providing an eerie original soundscape to accompany the hellish imagery.
From what we can surmise from the first preview, some Lovecraftian cosmic horror indigenous to the barren world has attacked and driven Riya’s colleagues to commit unspeakable acts. With the mysterious Brion’s assistance, they must piece together what caused the bloody slaughter. It’s a trippy “Event Horizon”-like teaser that does its job well as an intriguing calling card for a project that might just become a satisfying sleep hit in theaters come this spring.
For those fans unfamiliar with the name Flying Lotus, he’s a Los Angeles-based filmmaker, record producer, rapper, and DJ whose real name is Steven D. Bingley-Ellison. His movie work has been seen in the 2017 body horror comedy, “Kuso,” and the “Ozzy’s Dungeon” segment for the Shudder Original, “V/H/S/99,” from 2022.
With a screenplay written by Swiss-born actor Jonni Remmler, “Ash” is produced by Nate Bolotin and Mathew Metcalf and executive produced by Nick Spicer, Maxime Cottray, Aram Tertzakian, Maile Daughtery, Flying Lotus, Neill Blomkamp, Dave Brown, and Adam Riback.
“Ash” lands in theaters on March 21, 2025, followed by its streaming debut on Shudder.
