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There is nothing like a good creature feature with practical effects. While we can’t know if the movie will be any good until it is actually finished, the folks at Playmaker and Neopol Film have teamed up to bring us a good old-fashioned practical creature feature in the form of Paws. The creature in question will be a polar bear and the director at the helm will be Lukas Rinker (Holy Shit!)
According to Variety, the companies have joined forces to launch international sales of the film at the Cannes Film Market. You can see some early artwork above. It’s promised that Paws will feature a “stellar international cast” that has yet to be announced. Now for the good stuff. What is the movie going to be about, exactly? The synopsis reads as follows:
“In the film, a ship crashes in the Arctic, leaving climate researcher Tessa and her team stranded. Searching for help inside an abandoned tanker wreckage, they stumble upon a starved polar bear, looking to protect her cub and feed on the survivors. To make matters worse, Tessa’s team betrays her honorable cause and probes the deep sea for potential oil fields, perceiving her as an expendable threat to their greedy scheme. Now Tessa’s only chance of survival and to protect this eco-system is an uneasy alliance with the equally endangered Mama bear.”
It’s an intriguing premise in the “so ridiculous it sounds like a blast” sort of way. It’s the kind of over-the-top nonsense that helps make movies like Deep Blue Sea so fun. If the practical effects pan out, this could be a real winner. Tonio Kellner, producer for Neopol Film, had this to say about it:
“We at Neopol Film believe Paws is the perfect narrative for the current horror movie zeitgeist – an icy creature-feature set at the melting North Pole, promising entertaining and suspenseful thrills and kills, intertwined with a crisp layer of relevance. With Paws we’re super excited, and can’t wait to finally ‘unleash the Polar Bear,’ to continue our close collaboration with Lukas and The Playmaker after the success of our joint venture, Holy Shit!, alongside these fantastic partners: Samsara Film, Grasp the Nettle Films, Lunar Lander Films, Rein Film, Biomimic Studio and our German distributor Weltkino.”
“Following the incredible success of our collaborations on Holy Shit! and Rubikon, we are thrilled to once again join forces with Lukas Rinker, Neopol and Samsara Film,” Moritz Hemminger, head of sales and acquisitions at The Playmaker, added. “Paws boasts a highly compelling story, extreme production value and a phenomenal cast. We are confident that it will be a standout title at the Marché du Film and look forward to sharing more info about the project with international distributors.”
Paws does not have a release date but it’s very early days for this one, so stay tuned.
