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Guy Pearce and Bailee Madison are Afraid of Del Toro's Dark

by Alex Billington
June 30, 2009

Two more actors have joined the cast of Guillermo del Toro's Don't Be Afraid of the Dark to be directed by his protege Troy Nixey. Guy Pearce is in final negotiations and 9-year-old actress Bailee Madison is set to star with Katie Holmes (who we announced in May). Madison will play a young girl who moves in with her father and his girlfriend (Holmes) and discovers they are sharing the house with demonic creatures. She discovers and is fascinated by the creatures - until they prove dangerous. Pearce will play the father, an author frustrated by his daughter's tales of monsters, not believing her even when his girlfriend backs her.

Don't Be Afraid of the Dark is based on the 1973 ABC TV movie. Guillermo del Toro co-wrote the updated script with Matthew Robbins (Dragonslayer, Mimic). Del Toro first discovered director Troy Nixey after watching his short film titled Latchkey's Lament (watch the trailer online) that captured the tone del Toro wanted for this project. I love the story, I love the cast, I love Guillermo del Toro, this is easily one of my most anticipated horror projects in the works. Its got a bit of a Pan's Labyrinth feel to it, but I imagine it won't be anything like that in the end. Shooting is scheduled to start next month in Melbourne, Australia.

Explore tags: Casting, Movie News

Ruben Jr

Sounds a little like 'The Shinning' but with demons instead of ghost, but Del Toro has never let me down so i will be going to see this movie.
dave13

hmmm. Producing and not directing? I wonder how different this movie will be then from other Del Toro projects. i look forward to it thought!
w00t!!!

Hmmm...yeah. A totally unoriginal horror film with what? Creepy kid. Maybe not, obviously idk but people complained about the Orphan...or something like that about a creepy kid and it wasn't even the kid's fault or creepy really. Sounds like Messengers, Darkness, etc. Boring... Only horror film that I've seen lately that shows some kind of promise of horror is Trick r Treat. Drag Me to Hell was fun though. Reminded me of B rated horror films which just make you jump but perfectly. Doesn't necessarily make you afraid to walk around your house, alone, in the dark though.
S

I hope Del Toro has his hand in creating the demonic creatures.
Antioch

Cannot wait for this!~ I really hope they use suspense terror vs. gore, though. It makes movies like this 10X better.
bart

will Tom Cruise be one of the monsters?
Rachel

I'm 36 and have three vivid memories of being TERRIFIED from something I saw on tv as a young child: 1) the commercial for "The Shining" (specifically Shelley Duvall, actually), 2) the commercial for "Magic" (the slow zoom-in on the ventriloquist dummy, oh god) and 3) Don't Be Afraid of the Dark. It messed me up for years. There was an older kid at school who looked like the actress in this movie and I got the creeps just from seeing her in the hall. Del Toro has such a great instinct for nailing universal, innate childhood fear without being condescending - I'll bet this one turns out to be fantastic.
dan

i'm with #3 on this movie. it could be really good, but i imagine it'll be dumbed down for the teen crowd, and #3.......yea, "trick 'r treat" looks BADASS! i thought "drag me to hell" was excellent too.