The sequel to one of the most brutally gruelling horror movies of recent years seems finally to be underway, with the American Film Market playing host to this sales poster for **Wolf Creek 2. Director Greg McLean and original star John Jarratt are both returning.
Talk turned to a second outing for the matey psycho Mick Taylor almost as soon as the original (loosely based on the real life Peter Falconio case, involving a backpacker murdered in the Australian outback) hit in 2005. The pot was still bubbling a couple of years ago, when McLean told Moviehole, "I'd like to see what else Mick is up to, for sure, but I'm not sure anyone else in the world does. You've got to top the first one, and how much horror can you handle? If I did make Wolf Creek 2 it would almost have to be unreleasable, rated XXX, banned all over the world, never to be screened in public. That's kind of intriguing."
More recently he was able to reveal to Bloody Disgusting that he felt he'd finally cracked a workable script, "maintaining the logic and rules of the first movie [whilst ensuring] its link to reality and the true crime genre is never lost."
The great success of the original was the way it constantly wrong-footed its audience, seeming to start out as an odd sci-fi mystery about a crater, before veering into slasher territory and [SPOILER] killing the characters that seemed totally set up to survive. It's hard to imagine how those tricks can work so effectively a second time, and the official synopsis ("dream outback adventure becomes horrific reality when backpackers discover Wolf Creek's most infamous local") sounds like exactly the same again.
McLean seems confident though, and his star is clearly up for more, so we'll be eyeing this one with interest, and also fear and trepidation and quivering nervousness. Production starts early next year.