Type Motion Picture Website Official Website | Founded 2011, USA | |
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Genre Horror, Adventure, Comedy, Sci-fi, Thriller, Key people | ||
Radio Silence is a trio of filmmakers based in Los Angeles. The group is known for V/H/S, Devil's Due, and Southbound, as well as their previous work together as Chad, Matt & Rob.
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Members
Radio Silence was formed in 2011 by Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, Tyler Gillett, Justin Martinez and Chad Villella. The collective had worked together previously as Chad, Matt & Rob and were known for their unique blend of comedy, adventure, sci-fi and horror. Their most popular works include a series of Interactive Adventures and a collection of found footage prank films. Martinez later left the group.
V/H/S
Radio Silence's segment of V/H/S is titled 10/31/98 and the story is set on Halloween as a group of friends go in search for a Halloween party.
According to an interview with Complex, Radio Silence was brought into the V/H/S fold after producer Brad Miska saw Mountain Devil Prank Fails Horribly. Their segment was shot over four days around Los Angeles in August 2011.
The film was purchased at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival by Magnolia Pictures for slightly over $1 million. Limited theatrical release began October 5, 2012 in the United States and November 1, 2012 in Argentina. It was released onto DVD, Blu-ray, and digital download on December 4, 2012, and a limited edition VHS version was released on February 5, 2013.
Devil's Due
In 2014, the group's horror thriller Devil's Due was released on January 17, 2014, by 20th Century Fox. Made for $7 million, the film went onto to gross $36.9 million.
Director Eli Roth was vocal in his support of the film and in a series of posts on his official Twitter account, wrote "Don't pre-judge Devil's Due because Rosemary's Baby is a 'holy grail' movie. It's so smart, creative, inventive, and fun. Very very scary. The guys at Radio Silence killed it. Devil's Due is a legit scary, smart, horror film. So many awesome scenes. I loved it." Scott Weinberg of Fearnet described the film as "a darkly passionate homage to Rosemary's Baby, the similarities are both intentional and affectionate."
Southbound
Southbound premiered at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival and released theatrically by the Orchard on February 5, 2016.
The New York Times' Neil Genzlinger gave the film a positive review and wrote "Its five segments do what they're supposed to do—unsettle you—but as a bonus, they also leave you wanting more. These are fragments more than complete stories, and the incompleteness is its own kind of creepiness. The filmmakers aren't after tidy tales, neatly connected and concluded. They know that the human mind finds loose ends unnerving." Richard Roeper of the Chicago Sun-Times, who wrote that "It's one of the smartest and scariest movies in recent memory" and Rolling Stone's David Ehrlich wrote that the movie was "Like episodes of Twilight Zone that a baked Rod Serling might have written after watching Carnival of Souls, these chapters are eerie to the extreme, and seedy enough to make you feel like you're watching something you were never meant to see. It gets under your skin because it knows there's nothing scarier than realizing that—no matter how far you drive—the evil in your rearview mirror is always closer than it appears."
The Crawl
On Halloween 2016, the trio premiered their first podcast titled The Crawl with Radio Silence described as "In-depth conversations with film and TV artists of all stripes for a behind-the-scenes look at some of the most interesting and overlooked careers in entertainment."
Listener Ethan Dean finds The Crawl with Radio Silence to be a "unique and intriguing podcast, lined with knee-slapping gassers for any audience."
Chad, Matt & Rob
The group first worked together on a series of Interactive Adventures and a found footage short film called Mountain Devil Prank Fails Horribly for the Chad, Matt & Rob website.