“In Hollywood’s golden era, they were called ‘woman in peril’ pictures, and they included sophisticated thrillers, juicy noirs, and Dracula pictures,” Biller writes on her blog about her inspirations for the movie. “Many great directors tried their hand at them, producing some of the great noir, thriller, and horror classics.”
Biller says she’s found the perfect novel (which she’s keeping a secret) to adapt into a “a serial killer film in the style of the classic women in peril pictures.” I also could not be more stoked for the fact that she is going to go full 1960s, technicolor gothic with this movie, saying she’s feeling inspired by:
castles, mists, rich velvets and brocades, shimmering light, blazing candles in giant candelabra, heavy baroque furniture, ornate mirrors, women in long nightgowns fleeing from handsome, brooding men
Incidentally, this is also how I want my life to look on a daily basis.
Biller chose Bluebeard because she noticed that it embodies a very modern fear among women: that most or all have a part inside of them that fears men, often the same men they’re attracted to. You really just never know if the love of your life is hiding a closet somewhere in his mansion filled with the corpses of ex-wives! And even though it may take her years to perfect the film (remember how she exhaustingly wrote, directed, edited, and even made props and costumes for The Love Witch) I can’t wait to see her take on the material.
