Fans have been waiting for news on Panos Cosmatos' next project since 2018's surreal masterpiece, Mandy, and the filmmaker has enlisted a couple of A-list stars for what sounds like an intriguing horror thriller.
THR reports that Kristen Stewart and Oscar Isaac have signed on to play the leads in Flesh of the Gods, a vampire movie set in Los Angeles during the glittering 1980s.
The story is said to follow "a married couple, Raoul (Isaac) and Alex (Stewart), who descend each evening from their luxury skyscraper condo and head into an electric nighttime realm of ’80s LA. When they cross paths with the mysterious and enigmatic woman 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. “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.
Stewart has some vampire experience after starring in the Twilight movies, and can currently be seen in crime thriller Love Lies Bleeding, directed by Rose Glass. Isaac played Poe Dameron in the Star Wars sequel trilogy, and was last seen in Marvel Studios' Moon Knight series.
Mandy is a 2018 action horror film directed by Cosmatos, produced by Elijah Wood and co-written by Cosmatos and Aaron Stewart-Ahn based on a story Cosmatos conceived. A co-production of the United States and Belgium, the film stars Nicolas Cage, Andrea Riseborough, Linus Roache, Ned Dennehy, Olwen Fouéré, Richard Brake, and Bill Duke.
"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."