Tom Holland Dons an Irish Accent in an Exclusive ‘Pilgrimage’ Clip
by Haleigh Foutch August 11, 2017


Tom Holland‘s American accent was pretty much flawless in Spider-Man: Homecoming, but before he landed the role as the MCU’s friendly neighborhood web-slinger, Holland teamed with Jon Bernthal and Richard Armitage (talk about nerd bait) for the historical action film, Pilgrimage, and he had to tackle one of the most difficult accents on the planet for it. ack in June, we brought you a set of first look images for Pilgrimage, and with the film landing in theaters, on VOD and Digital HD today, we’re happy to debut a new clip.

Directed by Brendan Muldowney and written by Jamie Hannigan, the action film had its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival and takes place in 1209 Ireland and follows a group of monks who begin a pilgrimage across an island, transporting their monastery’s holiest relic to Rome. But their path becomes increasingly fraught with danger as their route brings them face to face with hostile territory that’s been torn apart through centuries of tribal warfare and the growing power of Norman invaders.

Alternately, you may remember this movie as the one where Bernthal and Holland teamed up to work on their Marvel audition tapes. While they were filming in Ireland, Bernthal was seeking the role of The Punisher on Daredevil Season 2 while Holland was trying to nab the role of Spider-Man for Captain America: Civil War. Sadly, we may never get to see those audition tapes but for now, check out the new Pilgrimage clip above.

Here’s the official synopsis for Pilgrimage:

Ireland, 1209. A small group of monks begin a reluctant pilgrimage across an island torn between centuries of tribal warfare and the growing power of Norman invaders. As they escort their monastery’s holiest relic to Rome, the true value of the bejeweled relic becomes dangerously apparent and their path becomes increasingly fraught with danger.

10 Aug 2017
Jon Bernthal Takes a Vow of Silence for Pilgrimage

The busy Punisher actor talks some of his August releases.

By Ed Douglas

If there’s any actor that might be considered an “actor’s actor” who has gone to great lengths for his craft, then Jon Bernthal has worked his butt off to get where he is now.

It’s been five years since Bernthal was a regular on AMC’s The Walking Dead, but he then got an even more high-profile gig as The Punisher in the second season of Netflix’s Daredevil. Bernthal’s version of Marvel’s Frank Castle proved popular enough to get him his own series, which he shot earlier this year and is expected to debut later in 2017.

Between doing those shows, Bernthal still found plenty of time to make movies, and he even found time to chat with IGN about a variety of topics.

Brendan Muldowney’s Pilgrimage couldn’t be any more different from Bernthal’s normal role, if there is such a thing, because it takes place during 13th century Ireland as it follows a group of monks on a dangerous journey through the rugged Irish landscape to bring a sacred relic back to Rome. The diverse group of monks is played by Stanley Weber, John Lynch, Hugh O’Conor and none other than Tom Holland, and Bernthal is playing a character simply known as The Mute, a man unable to speak who comes from a violent past.

Other than Pilgrimage, Bernthal still has a busy month ahead of him, appearing in Taylor Sheridan’s directorial debut Wind River (now in theaters), as well as Ric Roman Waugh’s upcoming Shot Caller, playing gritty criminal characters in both. (Jamie Dagg’s Sweet Virginia, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival last spring as did Pilgrimage, hasn’t figured out its distribution yet.) Read on for our full chat with Bernthal…


IGN: When you read the Pilgrimage script, how were you able to envision what the character would be without having any dialogue?

Jon Bernthal: But that’s the fun and challenge of it. There are seven languages spoken in this film, and there’s also the language of the mute, and that’s something you gotta come up with, and you have to do extensive work on the guy’s backstory. You have to come up with a reason why he’s come up with this vow of silence. One of the things I really wanted to dive into in order to do this was to see what that was like. And to go to Ireland and be silent, and not speak on set and not speak at home. That makes things difficult. We were all living under the same roof and had every meal together. We were together the whole time. To do that in silence, at first, was very isolating and frustrating, but I learned a ton about who this character is. I think on a film set [it’s important] to divorce yourself from your wants and your needs. We use our voice to ask for things, to say, “Hey, I gotta go to the bathroom” and “Hey, can I get a glass of water,” and if they’re passing out apples, “Hey, can I have an apple?” The mindset of someone who has taken a vow of silence [is,] “Oh, I want that apple, how do I get someone’s attention? Okay, I’m just going to let that go. Do I deserve that apple?” I think somebody who has done that, it comes from the shame of, “Do I deserve that? I’m going to divorce myself from these wants and only take what I need.” I think that’s the kernel of the character.

It was an interesting process to go through, being silent on set and off, and then it was interesting to get out of that process and realizing that the film would benefit a lot more. I need to start communicating, because we need to develop this language of the mute. You cover the guys that are talking, and I need to say, “Hey, at this moment here, I’m giving this look – that’s my line.” Brendan and I, we worked well on how to communicate. On a certain days I had to be silent. On certain days I didn’t.

IGN: You had mentioned earlier doing a lot of activities with the other guys in the cast. Were you remaining silent that whole time?

JB: So, yeah, for the first few weeks, silent 24/7, and then I started talking. All the guys decided as a group that they like me better where I’m silent, because once I started talking, I wouldn’t shut the hell up. But yeah, in the beginning, I think the day I really found it was the day when we got out to Western Ireland -- me and Tom Holland and Stanley Webber, we went to climb a mountain together, and we had met in Dublin, and we were talking and we were out before the process started, and then on the train out there, I just wrote them a note that said basically I’m done talking. We climbed this mountain together, and we really started to learn a lot.

IGN: Is that a very common thing you do on movies, trying to stay in character, especially when you’re playing someone very different from yourself?

JB: You know, yes and no. What I was saying before is … staying in character. I feel like you have all these artists working together in all these different departments on a film, both in pre-production, camerawork and post-production. All we’re trying to do is work on the 15 seconds you have between “action” and “cut.” I think that if the work you do when the camera is not rolling is what makes the work work between “action” and “cut”… To just sort of turn on, I think some actors are better than others. I don’t think I’m good enough to do that. I think I have to, with some degree, sort of stay with characters, have it be alive inside of me, and sometimes, fully. When you go home at night, often times, it’s not best to just turn off. You gotta come up with techniques and ways to stay on. As far as “staying in character,” I’m not sure what that means. I think everybody has a different idea about it. For me and this, it was an exercise to do that. I learned a lot, I got what I needed out of it, and then I stopped.

IGN: How was it being silent on set but also being able to communicate with Brendan or the crew about what you need? As an actor, I’m sure you need things from make-up and hair.

JB: In the beginning, I was talking. I only did it for the first couple weeks, but through that, from the actors to the hair and make-up team to the crew, Brendan, everyone was extraordinarily understanding. Look, at the end of the day that was something I did for me and my process and made their jobs harder. That being said, I’m a firm believer that when you do a film, your hair belongs to the hair department, your face belongs to make-up. Your body belongs to wardrobe when they’re dressing you, and you’ve got to be cool with that.

IGN: Do you consider yourself religious? And was that something you were able to tap into for a movie like this?

JB: I think with him, I definitely consider myself spiritual. I think with this character, he’s a man who has done so much in the name of religion. There’s so much violence and so much dedication to religion by the characters in this film, and he’s a man who’s seen probably the worst violence that has ever been caused by religion by being in the Crusades. I think part of his penance and his vow of silence is to never commit violence again in the name of the church. I think he’s seeing just how ugly that can be. What’s so powerful for me about the story is the bond he forms with this young man in this group of monks causes him to engage in this violence that he swore he would never [do again]. It’s not because of a love or commitment to a higher power, it’s a lot for his fellow man on his earth right next to him. It’s a beautiful statement.

IGN: How do you decide to parcel your time off from your TV commitments, so you can commit to something like this?

JB: Look, it’s just when something comes up, you read it, you look into the filmmaker and sometimes it’s a filmmaker you’re dying to work with, sometimes it’s a discovery, and you just try to choose the best material possible. But you’re right. There’s a real opportunity cost, and I got three young kids and any job means I’m not with them, and I’m gone a lot for the TV show. You gotta really weigh a bunch of things. At the end of the day, I have a very curious heart, and I love the journey of this job. I’m in no way trying to arrive anywhere. I just want to keep growing and struggling, and I look for jobs that scare me. I look for jobs that are not easy. I look for jobs where my first instinct is that I’m probably not the right guy for this, and then see if I can make myself fit, and what’s my version of this? And is that something that resonates in my heart?

IGN: What was interesting about doing Shot Caller after working with Ric Roman Waugh on Snitch? He’s told me it’s a companion piece to his movie Felon.

JB: I love Ric, Ric’s my brother, and I’ll work with Ric on anything. That really was what that was. I was in Ireland finishing up Pilgrimage, and I talked to Ric via satellite phone in the States and I hadn’t done much talking on the phone, and he was like, “Hey, man, I need you brother,” and I was like, “I’ll be there.” He’s my guy that I’ll always work with.

IGN: I want to ask about going into the Punisher, because it’s different times now where it used to be where you’re either a movie actor or a TV actor, and now TV shows are so good, you can do both. But what’s the commitment like to take on a character where you have your own show and possibly will do more in the future?

JB: It’s long and it’s arduous, and it’s hard, and you’ve gotta put everything into it. Look, I think the one thing to keep in mind is the way Netflix delivers content. So many of these places are delivering content, so you’re not making episodic TV. You’re making 13-hour movies that you don’t have to spend 10 minutes at the top and back of every episode telling people what you told them last week and bringing the audience back in. People are watching this in a much different way, and they’ve proven this model of 13-hour binge-watching is totally possible. Some people can, some people can’t, but at the end of the day, most people when they watch it do not say, “Okay, there’s 13 episodes. I’m going to watch one per week.”

IGN: That’s interesting, because I like spacing things out when I watch shows.

JB: And that’s great. You can watch it that way. I just know that the way that the filmmakers attack it, they don’t need to remind you what you saw last week or put a cliffhanger at the end of each episode. I think the delivery system is different, but the challenges from TV, you’ve got to fit a lot into an eight-day episodic TV schedule, and it’s very challenging, especially with the ambition of the fights and the scope of those shows.

IGN: I’m not sure when you shot Pilgrimage but had you already booked appearing on Daredevil at that time?

JB: I sent my audition tape for Punisher while I was in Belgium.

IGN: And that was before Tom Holland signed on to play Spider-Man, too?

JB: So we were making audition tapes for Spider-Man and he helped me. He’s in my Punisher tape, so I saw him through that whole process, and again, it was watching him go through it and the way he attacked it and went after it. It was completely inspiring. I think Tom Holland is just an absolute beast and a wonderful person.

IGN: I’m sure a lot of people would someday like to see your Punisher with his Spider-Man, because as you probably know, Punisher’s first appearance was in The Amazing Spider-Man...

JB: Oh, s#!t. I’ll probably be the last to find out.

IGN: Do you even know if you’ll be back for the next season of Daredevil?

Bernthal: They haven’t mentioned it. I know nothing.

IGN: Your other Tribeca movie, Sweet Virginia, is interesting because you play a former rodeo cowboy managing a motel, and it’s always following two different characters, not just yours. What appealed to you about doing something like that?

JB: Again, the challenge of it. I loved the script. I loved Jamie Dagg’s movie River … and I thought the theatricality and the style of the script would just be so interesting to be attacked by a guy like Jamie who made such a cutting and antiseptic, raw, real, gritty movie like River. So I thought that was great, but for me, that role was originally written in the script as a guy who was 65 years old. For me, I went into it like, “Why would you ever want me in this part? I’m not the right guy.” What Jamie and I really worked on was how do we achieve what you gain from having the character be 65 years old by having him played by someone in their late 30s? That’s why we added the tremors and the early onset Parkinson’s. In the fight with the loud neighbor, I was originally supposed to beat him up, but I said, “Well, what if he beats me up?” To try to gain the things you get from a guy who is a little worn in and older, but you play that in a younger man who’s got so much potential life ahead of him, but he’s there kind of giving up until this violent act comes and shakes things up in that town. It was really the challenge of it, and I thought it was a beautiful script, and then Chris [Abbott]. I saw James White, and I really wanted to work with him and I was really blown away by his performance.

Pilgrimage opens in select theaters and will be available On Demand starting Friday, August 11.

Interview: Brendan Muldowney opens up about his bloody battle epic ‘Pilgrimage’

August 11, 2017 by Nick Johnston



Irish director Brendan Muldowney has made significant waves in his native country with films like Savage and Love Eternal, but his work’s only recently started making its way over to the United States. His new film, the historical thriller Pilgrimage, which releases today in select theaters and VOD/Digital HD today (August 11), marks a large step forward for the director; its setting in the Middle Ages is a significant departure from his prior work, and offers a glimpse of an Ireland rarely seen in any cinema. It’s a bloody and thrilling romp, full of unexpected violence and gorgeous landscapes.

Pilgrimage stars Tom Holland (Spider-Man: Homecoming, The Lost City of Z) as a young monk tasked by the Vatican along with other members of his order to transport a relic of supposed “great power” along the Irish countryside so that it may be picked up and sent to Rome for help in an upcoming Crusade. The Normans, here represented by an evil knight (Richard Armitage, The Hobbit films) and his cohorts, want the power for themselves, and the only person standing in the way between the monks and annihilation is a mute (Jon Bernthal, The Wolf of Wall Street, Netflix’s The Punisher), atoning for some unknown transgression, who may be more capable with a sword than he seems.


Muldowney talked with Vanyaland by phone from his home, discussing how preparation is key to making a great action sequence, how Holland just has an “honest” look about him, and what’s next for the filmmaker.

Nick Johnston: What drew you to this project?

My friend was the writer, and he brought me this script about [a few monks] dragging a relic across Ireland, and that was really what hooked me. What I liked was the time period, which was an original time period for Irish film; I thought the locations were stunning, and he said there would be some action in it, and I went “Great!” That was very exciting. And I loved that it was about Monks, and that there were religious themes in it.

Why do you think religious relics hold such an allure in modern storytelling?

[laughs] Well, that’s a new one! It’s interesting, have you noticed some sort of trend?

Not necessarily recently — we’ve got the new big-budget Mummy movie, and classic stuff like the Indiana Jones series looming over everything…

Oh, oh yeah — the Covenant.

Why do you think these things endure?

This is a total guess, but I would say in the same way as the Ring [presumably from The Lord of the Rings], they’re a macguffin, aren’t they? They allow for an important thing to be dragged around, or fodder for villains to chase, and I suppose that they can be magical to us as well. And we play with that in our film. And you know, in Raiders of the Lost Ark, it really is magical.

How was it collaborating with [cinematographer] Tom Comerfield on the look of the film? What specific things about his work fit the film?

Well, I figured pretty early on that I wasn’t going to try and compete with Hollywood’s biggest productions or even television, like Game of Thrones or Vikings. My shooting time was so small. My assistant director went on afterwards and did Game of Thrones — “The Battle of the Bastards” — and he had three weeks to shoot that one scene, and I had three days to shoot my ambush scene, and that’s the difference between the scale.

So I realized I wasn’t going to be doing anything with cranes or steadicams or tracks even. But I didn’t come to that conclusion first — it was actually sort of a combined effort. I knew that I couldn’t compete, but I also felt, how do you present that difference to Hollywood, anyway? How do you do it when you have a hundred grand, or through the lens of a social realist? So I did my best by making it handheld, and I think it gives it a grittier feel. It also really helped us move fast. You know, you’re talking about a look with the DP, but I had to shoot some scenes with eight close-ups, because eight people have lines, and you’re trying to do two scenes a day. It’s a lot of terrible pressure, so, in a way, it was move fast and get it done.

We discussed some things, like Werner Herzog’s films and Valhalla Rising, and there were a couple other touchstones that I can’t recall, but I just knew that it was always going to be widescreen, that I was gonna use the landscape, and that was going to mean wider lenses so that we could move and so that the camera maybe could swing from side to side, from a character to a character without having huge focus issues. And that’s how the style built out from there.

That Ambush scene that you mentioned is fantastic — it’s so visceral, like that moment when Bernthal’s cleaves a sword into an ambusher’s head, and the noise that it makes afterwards.

You know, that’s interesting, because — I’ll just tell you briefly — I love a lot of the ambush, but when I look at that shot, I feel that when the sword head the head, that head would have been forced downwards by the blow more, so when I look at it, I go “that’s a director’s mistake.” I should have talked more with the visual effects guys about that movement. I’m sorry, I must be boring you with that, with my old director insecurities. [laughs]

How long did it take to choreograph and stage that scene?

Well, the stunt guys worked for two weeks before we shot — not two weeks solid, but at least every day before, because everyone was doing different things. I worked for at least six months beforehand, going through everything in the script where there was a violent [moment and working from there, be it] in large meetings or small emails or one-on-one meetings, and I would have been talking to visual effects, stunts, make-up, special effects, and maybe practical blood and saying “How do I do this? How do I do a man who’s arm has been nearly chopped off?” And visual effects would offer me something, and I’d realize the cost of that was too expensive, and I’d go “Well, with an amputee, the prosthetics would be a little bit cheaper.”

Then we’d color-code everyone that was involved from costumes — costumes were in blue — and everyone would get these color-coded breakdowns. And when you think about it, there were a lot of them in the ambush and in the end [sequence]. There was really no one else who could do that, so I had to spend six months working on that every day, and of course it’d change, and you’d find problems, but it was a lot of preparation. And really, with relatively no money in comparison, you find yourself in the “triangle” situation. You know, where the points on the triangle are cost, time and quality, and you can only have two. So, I’ve always figured to a lot of preparation.

What qualities about Tom Holland told you’d he’d be right for this kind of role, especially before he blew up as Spider-Man?

Yeah, a lot of them [hadn’t], Jon Bernthal wasn’t the Punisher [yet] either. I was sent a list of actors who were young enough to play the role. You know, there’s a lot of things — a lot of young actors look older, they’re bigger — but mainly, I watched him in The Impossible and in this film called How I Live Now, and watching him I just went, “Oh, yeah.” It’s very hard to explain. I’ve said this a few times, but I’ve always said it wrong, and I’ll try to say it again properly. When I look at him — not only in film, but when I see him in real life or whatever — there’s a truthfulness to him, that I believe what he’s saying and doing. And that’s not even an acting skill, it’s just luck, he has it instinctively. You just believe him. So, in [this role, as] this blank slate and innocent novice, I thought he’d be brilliant and he was. And obviously you’ve seen him as Spider-Man, and he’s a lot more flexible — he can do a lot more. So, I Skyped with him as soon as I could and offered him the role in a heartbeat.

Was it easy convincing an actor like Bernthal to take a role in which he’d be mute for most of the film?

[laughs] I think that attracted him [to it]. You know, Jon’s the type of guy who likes a challenge. And, when you think about it, when you don’t have lines that’s even more challenging for an actor. I think that appeals to someone like Jon. He loves to push himself, and it was a physical role. He’s a physical guy, so I figure he looked at and thought “I can do this. This is a character in this, and it can be good.” He went silent for the first week of shooting.

How was that?

Well, it’s like you’d imagine. Well, actually, he did it for the first couple of days before the shoot and for the first week of shooting. And it helped him. Like, did he really need to ask for a glass of water? And he said, by the time he started talking again, that he’d learned what he needed to do for the character by going silent for all that time.

How did this film change on you over the course of production and post-production?

Every film does. That’s just the nature of filmmaking for me. The script was, you know, bigger in ambition and in scale, so during prep, during the three months before, we really cut characters and amalgamated scenes, and during the two weeks right before [we shot] I was cutting lots of stuff, from the scale of extras, to how many horses [we’d need], to how many knights, and so the scale was definitely turned back. Then, with actors, and with the problems that we might have on a day’s shooting, from weather to the horses not cooperating — obviously a ton of problems happen, and the film does change. The coverage you get is different than what you think. All of these changes aren’t necessarily bad; it’s just an evolution of what’s happening. And then in the edit, the same thing happens, and the music’s added. But there’s always a core — a core strength or a core idea or feeling that you had about the film — that generally survives.

What’s next for you?

Well, I have a nice ghost story, based on a short film that we did called The Ten Steps, and I have a dark coming-of-age story and I have — these are all projects I’ve written myself — and I have a political thriller set in the ’80s. But they’re only projects I’ve written myself, and I’d be very open to seeing what my agent brings me, and I’m not against working in television either. So, I don’t have a full answer for that at the moment — I’m quite open — but I’m looking around.

INTERVIEW: Director Brendan Muldowney takes a ‘Pilgrimage’ in 13th-century Ireland
August 14, 2017 John Soltes

Pilgrimage, the new film from director Brendan Muldowney, follows a group of monks as they carry a special relic across Ireland in 1203. The historical action film is set amidst dangerous times and tribal warfare, which make the monks’ journey anything but pleasant. The film, which is now playing in theaters, on VOD and Digital HD, stars Tom Holland (Spider-Man: Homecoming), Jon Bernthal (The Walking Dead) and Richard Armitage (Captain America: The First Avenger).

“Well, myself and the producer knew the writer, [Jamie Hannigan],” Muldowney said of the project’s early stages. “We knew him for a long time actually. The producer used to live with him, and so we just used to chat. He came to me one day, and he kind of pitched [the story], which was monks traveling across 13th-century Ireland, dragging a relic. And he said there was going to be an ambush, and it hooked me immediately from that. I thought it was incredibly original. I thought it was something that we’ve never shown in Irish cinema before. I thought the locations would be amazing. I liked the idea of the action, and I love themes of religion and existence. So the whole package that he pitched, we kind of just went for immediately.”

Muldowney and company developed the project for five years through many different drafts. This extended time period allowed the creative team to become even better filmmakers, which, in the director’s mind, served the project well.

The casting was quite fortuitous. Bernthal and Armitage were bonafide figures in Hollywood, and Holland’s star was on the rise. Now, after a year of impressive movies and television shows highlighting this trio’s work, Pilgrimage finds itself with an even bigger all-star cast.

“We had a great casting director, Dan Robert, and he put together books from all the agencies,” Muldowney said. “I went through them, and the first one we really focused on was The Novice. I watched Tom Holland in The Impossible and How I Live Now, and I thought he was brilliant. … This is well before he was Spider-Man.”

He added: “Jon Bernthal and Richard Armitage loved the script. They obviously were given it to read. And they came back, and they said, ‘We’d like to be in it.’ … They came, and they were like decent human beings that got really stuck into the job. It was fantastic.”

Hannigan, the writer of Pilgrimage, conducted a lot of research about the time period and its religiosity. Muldowney called him a “very methodical worker” that made the filmmaking much easier. Hannigan even gave Muldowney a list of books to read to reacquaint himself with the 13th century.

“Very early on I decided that authenticity was going to be the keyword for how I would deal with every department,” the director said. “If production design came to me and said, ‘What?’ I’d say, ‘Authenticity.’ I want it dirty and gritty, so that went into the cinematography. And I felt like a social realist handheld feel was going to be the way to do this. I also felt that there was no point competing with the bigger shows out there like Game of Thrones or even bigger films. They have the money, the time, with cranes and stuff. At one stage, I said, ‘I don’t want any tracks. I don’t want any drones, helicopters. I want it to feel like it’s from the 13th century.’ … I was going to try and make it as low key as possible.”

There were also financial realities. Muldowney said they could have used three or four times the budget, but they made the production work with the resources they were given. The dedication paid off, and Muldowney has clear evidence of this. His assistant director went on to shoot an episode of Game of Thrones.

“It was Battle of the Bastards, which is probably one of the best battle sequences I’ve ever seen,” Muldowney said. “He had three weeks to shoot that battle sequence. We had three days to shoot our ambush, so it really shows you the difficulty. But add into that a low budget and a very tight time schedule that you’ve got, and horses, four languages, stunts, fight choreography, and the Irish weather. There were so many things that are always against you, yet when people pull together, that’s when you can work and find the solution to any problem.”

By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com

Evans, Pattinson, Holland To Join Antonio Campos’ THE DEVIL ALL THE TIME
September 7, 2018

One of my favorite films last year was Brendan Muldowney’s Pilgrimage. It was a small-scaled medieval thriller that I was just lucky enough to catch on the big screen. I have no idea how big of a splash Pilgrimage had on the film scene last year, but I appreciate my own viewing of the film. I bring this film up due to its main cast featuring MCU actors Tom Holland and Jon Bernthal, as well as a fierce turn from Richard Armitage. With all of that in mind, I wonder if Antonio Campos’ upcoming The Devil All The Time will turn out much the same way as Pilgrimage.

Deadline reports that Holland, as well as his fellow MCU co-star Chris Evans, Robert Pattinson, Mia Wasikowska and Tracy Letts are all in talks to join the cast of The Devil All The Time, a film based on the 2011 novel of the same name by Donald Ray Pollock. The site states that the film is scheduled to start production next February.

Deadline also offered the following synopsis for the book and film:

“The novel’s plot: In a place called Knockemstiff, Ohio, a forgotten backwoods of this country – a storm of faith, violence and redemption brews. Out of desperation to save his dying wife, our protagonist Willard Russell turns to prayer which succumbs to sacrifice. His son Arvin (Holland) is growing from a kid bullied at school into a man who knows when to take action. The cast of characters includes a serial killer couple, a faith-testing preacher and a corrupt local sheriff (Evans) in a story told across two decades.“

Much like Pilgrimage, I have no idea how big of a splash this upcoming project will make. But sometimes it’s the small projects that float under the radar that end up being among the most memorable films you see in a year. With a bit of luck, The Devil All The Time will provide that.

Obviously we here at Revenge of the Fans are all fans of the superhero films, but it’s actually Robert Pattinson I’m most interested in seeing here, considering his reinvention over the past several years as one of the finest actors out there today. I’m still a bit more excited to see his upcoming film with The Witch director Robert Eggers (The Lighthouse), but this should make for an interesting film too.

Be sure to leave a comment below!