The latest from writer/director Brandon Cronenberg (Antiviral) brings the gore. So much so that Neon’s releasing it as “uncut,” with all the blood-soaked violence left intact. More than just gory, Possessor is an arresting, cerebral sci-fi thriller featuring riveting performances by an impressive cast. It follows corporate assassin Tasya Vos (Andrea Riseborough), who controls other people’s bodies through brain-implant technology to execute her targets. The more embedded she gets in her latest assignment, the more trapped her mind becomes, threatening to completely consume her identity.
Neon is releasing Possessor in theaters and drive-ins starting tonight (October 2), kicking off the Halloween season with a visceral bang. It might be a mind-bending sci-fi thriller, but horror DNA is woven throughout. Not just in the insane practical-effect driven carnage, but the powerhouse cast, as well. Many of whom have strong horror roots.
In celebration of Possessor’s release, we look back at the film’s stars’ horror roots.
Andrea Riseborough – Tasya Vos
Riseborough first made waves stateside with an appearance in the popular, yet grim series Black Mirror. The fourth series episode “Crocodile” saw Riseborough playing Mia, a woman distressed about a cover-up hit-and-run. The following year, Riseborough captured horror-loving hearts everywhere as the eponymous character in Mandy. Her turn as the tortured, kind soul and love interest of Red (Nicolas Cage) grounded the fantasy-horror spectacle. This year, the actress led Nicolas Pesce’s The Grudge, a new entry in the popular J-horror franchise. Riseborough played Detective Muldoon, a single mother and weary cop determined to get to the bottom of a grisly string of murders stemming from one particular haunted house.
Christopher Abbott – Colin Tate
Abbott made his feature debut with the psychological thriller Martha Marcy May Marlene, which followed a paranoid woman struggling to adjust to normality after escaping a cult. The actor’s next notable horror film came from A24, Trey Edward Shults’s divisive It Comes at Night. Abbott played Will, a desperate father that seeks shelter with another family in their isolated home amidst a deadly outbreak. Tensions boil over as the threat of infection looms large. Proving Abbot is no stranger to gore and violence, he played the lead in Nicolas Pesce’s Piercing, an adaptation of a novel by Audition author Ryū Murakami.
Jennifer Jason Leigh – Girder
Veteran actor Leigh is no stranger to just about any genre of film, especially horror. The Hitcher may have featured a twisted cat-and-mouse chase between driver and sinister hitchhiker, but Leigh’s turn as an innocent waitress caught up in the game resulted in a memorable death scene. The actress showcased her range in Single White Female as an obsessed killer. A few years later, Leigh appeared in the Stephen King adaptation of Dolores Claiborne. In 1999, Leigh played game developer Allegra in David Cronenberg’s twisty sci-fi thriller eXistenZ. The prolific actress featured in the Twin Peaks revival series in 2017 and Amityville: The Awakening. Most recently, Leigh continued to show off her sci-fi horror chops in Annihilation, as the steely Dr. Ventress.
Sean Bean – John Parse
Bean may have unwittingly developed a reputation for dying a lot on camera, but the inexhaustible actor has racked up an insane number of credits. Before his turn in The Lord of the Rings trilogy as the ill-fated Boromir, but he also made several thrillers around that era, including Don’t Say a Word, Equilibrium, The Dark, and Flightplan. Horror fans likely know him best as Christopher Da Salva, a desperate father searching for his wife and adoptive daughter in Silent Hill, the cinematic adaptation of the popular video game. Two years later, Bean assumed the titular role once portrayed by Rutger Hauer in the remake of The Hitcher. The actor also starred in the period horror film Black Death, set during the bubonic plague’s peak.
Possessor can be experienced uncut in theaters and drive-ins starting TONIGHT, October 2, 2020.