Drop director says making the thriller was ‘cathartic’ following Scream 7 controversy
'This was a really cathartic way to deal with some of that stuff.'
Christopher Landon has revealed to Metro that directing Drop was ‘cathartic’ for him following horrific online abuse during the controversy around Scream 7.
Starring The White Lotus actress Meghann Fahy and It Ends With Us actor Brandon Sklenar, Drop is a new thriller that takes place on a first date that goes horribly wrong.
The film sees Violet (Fahy) threatened via digidrop (think AirDrop) to murder her date Henry (Sklenar) or else her son will be murdered in a home invasion, which she can witness on her home CCTV on her phone.
The high-stakes thriller seems completely unfathomable, but for the director, he revealed that be threatened by an invisible force was sadly something he could relate to.
Landon was appointed the director of Scream 7 in 2023 and described the job as a dream, but quickly things turned sour as Melissa Barrera was reportedly fired from her lead role as Sam Carpenter over comments she made about Israel’s war with Hamas on social media.
Jenna Ortega, who played her sister, Tara, walked off the project soon after, and after receiving huge amounts of online abuse, Landon also stepped away from the project.
To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video
Up Next
Previous Page Next PageDespite the horrific abuse he endured, the director has revealed that Drop was a ‘cathartic’ experience for him that helped him channel what he went through.
Addressing the controversy that led to his departure from Scream 7 he told Metro: ‘I’ve said to people that the movie met the moment for me. I was feeling a lot of things about that [situation], and I really related to Violet’s predicament.’
‘You know, really feeling like you’ve got this person who is attacking you, and you can’t, you can’t see them, you can’t really speak directly to them.
‘And that was certainly something that I was feeling at the time.
‘So this was a really cathartic way to deal with some of that stuff.’
Melissa Barrera (L) and Jenna Ortega (R) were both set to appear in Scream 7 until the backlash (Picture: Paramount/Everett/REX/Shutterstock) The pair starred in Scream 6 and were set to return for a sequel (Picture: Paramount/Everett/REX/Shutterstock) Landon has directed several horror films (Picture: Scott Kirkland/Shutterstock)Speaking to Vanity Fair, he detailed the extent of the online abuse and revealed it was why he eventually stepped away from directing the film.
‘People were threatening to kill me and my family, to the point where the FBI was getting involved,’ he said. ‘I got messages saying, “I’m going to find your kids, and I’m going to kill them because you support child murder.”
Landon and his husband of nine years, Cody Morris, have two sons aged five and eight.
‘The head of security at various studios and the FBI had to examine the threats. It was highly aggressive and really scary.’
The director has been married for almost a decade (Picture: JC Olivera/FilmMagic)The script was written by Jillian Jacobs and Chris Roach. Landon revealed to Metro that he joined the project after being completely hooked by the high-octane story.
‘I chewed my fingernails off reading the script. I loved the concept, I loved the characters, I loved the opportunity. I felt like it was a sort of modern Hitchcock kind of movie. And I loved the themes.’
The film tackles themes of domestic violence and abuse, with Violet learning to overcome a horrific past relationship where she and her son were held at gunpoint. Landon explained he felt films are a good vehicle to deliver important messages.
‘It’s a really difficult subject to talk about and to touch on in a film but also something that’s really close to me. I’ve had people very dear to me go through similar situations, and so I really wanted to approach it from a place of honesty.
‘And to push this message that so many survivors of domestic abuse are the most resilient people on Earth, and there is hope, and that’s really what the message of the movie ultimately is.’
He added: ‘I think it’s a great message for audience members, it’s a good way to talk about the subject.’
The Happy Death Day director explained that while he always aims to make films that are entertaining, powerful messages are often at the heart of the narrative.
‘I’m always trying to, like, Trojan horse, kind of heavy themes, but then they’re disguised in very entertaining movies. For me, that’s the best way to reach the biggest group of people as possible.’
The film stars Fahy and Skelnar as a couple on a first date (Picture: AP) What's new in the cinemas this April? A Minecraft movie, April 4 Death of A Unicorn, April 4 Drop, April 11 The Amateur, April 11 One to One: Yoko & John, April 11 Sinners, April 18 Until Dawn, April 25 The Friend, April 25The film focuses on the weaponisation of technology to cause harm, something that has been highlighted in other popular films and TV shows, and is only causes more anxiety as technology progresses.
‘I think Black Mirror is a show that’s really spoken to our collective cultural anxiety over technology.
‘I think we all feel it, and we all have these experiences where this thing that was designed for our convenience can still be used against us. And I think it’s a really relatable thing.
‘It doesn’t matter what the technology is, the threat is never the technology. The threat is people.
‘There’s always going to be a bad person who’s going to use that to harm someone else, or to use it to their advantage. And I think that’s what’s ultimately really scary to me, is that there are just really scary people out there who want to use this stuff to do bad things.’
Landon added that of course, Apple did not want them using AirDrop in this film, so they invented an app, ‘Digidrop,’ for the movie.
‘We had to create our own type of app and technology because it’s proprietary. A lot of these companies, they don’t want their product being used for nefarious purposes.’
He added that this was a source of anxiety for fears that fans wouldn’t understand the tech.
‘I was really nervous about that at the beginning, and then once we started showing the movie to people, they totally got it.’
The thriller is in cinemas now (Picture: AP)Horror films have been a relatively safe bet for performing well at the box office, and Landon predicts that people are ready to ditch sequels and invest in original stories – and a good 90s-style thriller.
‘Right now we’re in this phase where it’s like everything is sort of IP-driven, or sequel or remake, and so it’s tough for an original movie.
‘Horror movies, luckily, have had a pretty good run theatrically, but I think thrillers kind of went out of fashion.
‘I kept telling everybody that I feel like the 90s thriller is coming back, and I think it needs to come back. That was certainly something that also inspired this movie.’
He added that he hopes the film is just the start of a resurgence of fun thrillers – something that he believes audiences are ‘jonesing for’.
‘With Drop, I’m really hoping that we’re at the front of a sort of thriller phase for cinemas. That would be amazing, because I do think people are jonesing for something that feels different.’
Drop is playing in cinemas now.
Got a story?
If you’ve got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the Metro.co.uk entertainment team by emailing us [email protected], calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff page – we’d love to hear from you.
