Bret Easton Ellis to Make Directorial Debut with Relapse

Bret Easton Ellis, the author who gave us American Psycho back in 1991, is getting behind the camera for the upcoming monster movie Relapse, which he wrote and will star Strangers Things‘s Joseph Quinn, according to Variety.

Described as an elevated monster flick, with a creature design from DDT Studios, Relapse will feature Quinn as Matt Cullen, who checks into rehab after witnessing a horrific death during a drugged-up party. Three months later, he is set to get his life back together, staying at his parent’s mansion in the hills of Los Angeles. But things have changed around Matt and everything seems off balance. Fueled by his unstable personality and the invading power of social media, Matt’s paranoia grows, messing with his rehabilitation program. As he starts using again, a mysterious presence starts growing around Matt, and a monster that has been haunting him since he was a teenager reveals itself. His therapist tries to help, convinced that the monster is actually in Matt’s head.

“I grew up watching the iconic horror movies of the 1970s,” says Ellis. “I’ve written Lunar Park, a horror novel, as an homage to Stephen King. It seems appropriate that my first feature would be a horror film. There is a simplicity to Relapse that seems like the perfect form for my directing debut: something direct and impactful.”