As we begin a new year, so does another year of highly anticipated movies, with the most recent Golden Globe Awards ushering in the countdown to the Oscars. And being one who actually went to three movies over the holidays last month and watching them in more spacious seats & theaters, the slate of what's ahead in 2017 on the big screen might actually give me a reason to come to the movies a little more often this year.
This winter sees the sequel to Fifty Shades of Grey --
Fifty Shades Darker, plus
Sleepless with Jamie Foxx,
Fist Fight with Ice Cube, and
Kong. As spring arrives, so will the next chapter in The Fast and The Furious saga in
The Fate of The Furious,
The Power Rangers Movie,
Guardians of the Galaxy 2 and the live-action
Beauty & The Beast. Of course, all eyes are on the summer blockbuster season with
Baywatch,
Wonder Woman,
The Mummy,
Transformers,
Despicable Me,
Spider Man 3 and
Blade Runner 2049. And that's only a handful that's ahead in these next 12 months.
There's another anticipated film dropping this year, but it's likely you won't see it unless you live in Boston or those six states in the Northeast known as New England. Those who follow the Trifecta know that the entire region has been a proud hub for alumni of the RW/Challenge franchise and Are You The One?, and the newest member of this fraternity is Boston native Tyler, taking a break from modeling down in Florida to look for love and money in the Caribbean. Of course, all eyes are on the upcoming Challenge as champions
Cara Maria,
Zach and
Camila appear headed for a collision course with underdogs
Bruno and
Dario among others.
That film that's headed to local theaters in the New England area later this year is called
Habit, an low-budget horror thriller produced and directed by independent local director
Johnny Hickey, and has been in production for over a month now. Given that they've been filming over the holidays, they have had to endure the cold of sub-20 degree conditions and sometimes having to film with no heaters inside some old mental institutions where the movie is being situated and filmed in. It feels very much appropriate for a film with such a dark and chilling theme.
In a photo posted on its
Facebook page,
Habit's plot sees this story take place at a EDM event in an abandoned underground mental hospital where 8 young adults experience not only the time of their lives, but also the last day of their lives. A party girl named Ray-Ray brings her friends to the rave at the hub of the area's electronic dance music scene, invited to come there by a drug dealer with connections to dance music. She had previously had a sexual encounter with the dealer, but is dared to renew acquaintances with the manipulating promise of supplying she and her group with what's known as "Molly" - official name MDMA. It's best known by its alternative name of ecstasy (E), that recreational drug commonplace at raves, and that leads the group to not only get high, but find themselves in what's more like a real-life Halloween horror movie than a EDM gathering.
Director Hickey's first film in 2011 was called
Oxy Morons, which co-starred a childhood friend of his,
David Burns - the Bostonian on
Real World Seattle best known for his infamous late night meltdown inside the car of his love interest at the time and the one who cast him - Kira - on that season 19 years ago in the same city that just saw some bad blood roll through. As he set about his second movie from the director's chair, Johnny looked to cast not Hollywood big shots - as is usually the case for these indie flicks, but to that MTV acumen he gained from having David the first time out to ask three recent alumni of the Trifecta and a Challenge legend to dive into the acting world for the very first time.
He explains in
Dig Boston magazine, for which the cover is pictured above:
“The biggest thing is to get people you know you are going to jibe with in your cast. My cast are no-name actors—they’ve never done acting before, but we have four MTV personalities.” And in the realm of having three shows for this site to cover and for me to watch & follow very intently, and the region being a favorite of MTV casting directors, each of them will have representation in the cast of
Habit.
As a fan of
Are You The One? from the very beginning - and whose Season 1 premiere will be three years ago next weekend, all of you who were there to witness that enormously successful first chapter with that brilliant cast of Originals in the Hawaiian island of Kauai will be most excited to find out of the news that
Brittany will be playing that female lead of Ray-Ray. Since most of you last saw her on
Exes 2, she's been balancing filming this film during the day in what she feels is a haunted hospital of sorts with working after hours at Boston TV station WHDH, and doing hosting work for both regional sports network NESN and a local website.
Joining Brittany in this new endeavor of acting in front of the cameras rather than just living their lives and/or competing within their view is
Sabrina from last spring's
Go Big or Go Home Las Vegas season of Real World, who we saw write and record music and meet her biological mother for the first time, all the while staying sane in the madness of what happened there in downtown Sin City. And to complete the triple threat of Trifecta girls shifting their attention to screaming and running from the bad guy trying to kill them, there's
Emilee from
Real World Cancun of eight years ago (for which we did an In-Depth post on her cast hanging out with LMFAO on Thanksgiving), who we then saw on
The Challenge: Cutthroat and most recently being part of a short-lived love triangle with her, Jessica and Dustin on
Free Agents.
Emilee says,
"It started off a little rocky, but it’s progressed into something amazing. For me, the camera [on reality TV] amplifies your personality. I’m all for the dramatic, though, so the acting comes naturally." And Brittany adds,
"The Tewksbury [hospital] is haunted as f... It would be totally cold over here, then totally warm over there … It got you more in the mindset. We were going upstairs, and the energy just straight dropped into cold air."
And for the big one and much like the friendship he's had with David, Hickey has had a history with
C.T. since the two were six years old when they lived in the projects -- the much-talked public housing in Boston. The director adds,
"He’s one of my best friends, and now we’re making a movie together, which is amazing … I didn’t want him to be the handsome star. I wanted him to be a killer." The Rivals II champ adds,
"It’s a pretty gruesome character—something no one’s seen from me before. We used to shovel driveways together for money, and Johnny would go house to house to house, get his deposits, and then leave everyone hanging. He’d be sledding down Suicide Hill while the rest of us were still shoveling."
Dig Boston Magazine did a feature on the filming of the film, which you can check out
here; the exact release date for the film is not yet known. There's also a story on C.T. that's largely been overlooked after the passing of his longtime girlfriend - the late Diem Brown, and we'll share you that story during our upcoming coverage of The Challenge: Invasion for which he will be part of the Champions group coming next month.
