Nicolas Cage and American director Osgood Perkins will make a second “Longlegs” film, after the original feature film released two years ago enjoyed an unexpected success in theaters, reports Variety.
Paramount Pictures acquired the rights to the new project after the thriller about an FBI agent hunting down a mysterious serial killer who survived a childhood encounter with him was a huge hit in 2024 for independent studio Neon.
The film, aimed primarily at adult audiences, grossed more than $127 million worldwide, including $74 million in North American theaters and $53 million worldwide, according to boxofficemojo.
The box office was above all expectations for a horror film, even a psychological one, that is not part of an established franchise like “Scream” or “Halloween”. The success was all the greater considering that the feature film signed by Perkins had a production budget of only 10 million dollars.
The sequel to “Longlegs” will also be directed by Osgood Perkins
“We were able to pull off something really special by working with the film's creative team. You can achieve something truly extraordinary when you start a film as original as this and combine it with a custom marketing campaign thought out ahead of time,” Elisa Federoff, Neon's director of distribution, said at the time.
Variety notes that the success cemented the status of Perkins, now 51, as a master of horror films, having previously signed titles such as “The Blackcoat's Daughter” (2015), “I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House” (2016) or “Gretel & Hansel” (2020).
It was also a major success for American actress Maika Monroe, who played the role of the FBI agent who hunts down the criminal nicknamed “Longlegs”.
Perkins will also write and direct the new film “Longlegs,” which has yet to receive an official title. The original feature film was distributed in Romania under the name “Longlegs: The Soul Collector”.
Nicolas Cage will soon be seen in a series
As the project is in its early stages, it is almost impossible for the new Longlegs feature film to hit theaters before 2027.
But Cage, one of Hollywood's most prolific actors, will soon be seen in an original series to be released on streaming.
He will star in the series “Spider-Noir”, a film noir-style reinterpretation of the superhero Spider-Man, set in New York City during the Great Depression. The series will premiere on the Amazon Prime Video platform on May 27.
Viewers will be able to watch “Spider-Noir” in two modes, in “true black and white” and “true color,” depending on their preference.
