‘Maniac’ Debuts an Official Trailer Starring Elijah Wood

BloodDisgusting calls Maniac the best horror movie of the year, while The Hollywood Reporter says it’s “dirty” and “nasty” (since the trailer advertises THR’s quote, I’m assuming THR means that as a compliment). Elijah Wood, best known for playing a Hobbit, stars in the horror film from director Franck Khalfoun, and IFC Films is set to release it theatrically and on VOD on June 21, 2013.

Elijah Wood stars in Maniac

The Plot:

Just when the streets seemed safe, a serial killer with a fetish for scalps is back and on the hunt. Frank (Elijah Wood) is the withdrawn owner of a mannequin store, but his life changes when young artist Anna (Nora Arnezeder) appears, asking for his help with her new exhibition. As their friendship develops and Frank’s obsession escalates, it becomes clear that she has unleashed a long-repressed compulsion to stalk and kill.

A 21st-century Jack the Ripper set in present-day L.A., Franck Khalfoun’s Maniac, produced by Alexandre Aja and composed by Rob of the band “Phoenix”, is a re-boot of the William Lustig cult film considered by many to be the most suspenseful slasher movie ever made – an intimate, visually daring, psychologically complex and profoundly horrific trip into the downward spiraling nightmare of a killer and his victims.