The Projection Booth

A rejected horror-short application turned into a movie about what happens when retirees run the set. Sean Cisterna couldn't find funding for The Rug (2025), so he pitched a New Horizons for Seniors grant, recruited a crew in their 70s, 80s and 90s, and filmed the chaos as Silver Screamers (2025), a Fantastic Fest world premiere reaching U.S. viewers on BloodStream November 6. Cisterna joins Mike to talk about the 96-year-old who raised her hand first, an insurer that refused to cover an 80-year-old camera operator, a rug brought to life by a marionette rig, Super 8 lifer Sonny at last handling an Alexa, and why the short plays free online as the doc's companion piece. His message: imagination doesn't retire.

Follow Silver Screamers at the film's official page.

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Become a supporter of The Projection Booth at http://www.patreon.com/projectionbooth 

The Projection Booth is part of the Weirding Way Media podcast network. Explore more of our shows at http://weirdingwaymedia.com.

A fisherwoman the village won't let alone commissions a basket weaver to build her a husband, and the husband is Alexander Skarsgård, worn as ten 3D-printed pieces of woven prosthetic with no CG replacement. Wicker (2026) is a new fable from directors Eleanor Wilson and Alex Huston Fischer, fresh from its Sundance premiere and opening nationwide October 30, with Olivia Colman, Peter Dinklage, Elizabeth Debicki and Richard E. Grant in a village where loneliness, marriage and gossip are funny because they are true. Eleanor and Alex, the pair behind Save Yourselves! (2020), join Mike to talk about 18 months with Weta Workshop, adapting Ursula Wills's short story, casting the village with comedians, and a test-screening crowd that went to war over the tailor's wife.

Follow Wicker on Instagram and visit the film's official website.

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-projection-booth--5513239/support.

Become a supporter of The Projection Booth at http://www.patreon.com/projectionbooth 

The Projection Booth is part of the Weirding Way Media podcast network. Explore more of our shows at http://weirdingwaymedia.com.

Forget the cabin in the woods: this coven comes for you at home on Halloween night. The Heretiks (2026), a Fantastic Fest world premiere headed to Sitges, follows renegade witch Cai (Kimberly Epstein) as she protects two sisters and a friend from her former coven, led by the terrifying Neve (Tess Williams). Director Gregg Bishop of Siren (2016) and Dance of the Dead (2008) spent ten years shopping the script by Luke Piotrowski and Ben Collins.

Mike talks with Bishop, Epstein, Williams, and Josie Wert, who plays Ada, about the concept trailer that finally won a green light, 26 night shoots, two weeks of rehearsal, child actors on strict curfews, real suburban locations near Bishop's hometown, handprint makeup effects, and watching it with a Fantastic Fest crowd.

Follow Gregg Bishop on Instagram.

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-projection-booth--5513239/support.

Become a supporter of The Projection Booth at http://www.patreon.com/projectionbooth 

The Projection Booth is part of the Weirding Way Media podcast network. Explore more of our shows at http://weirdingwaymedia.com.

What if detention were group therapy? Detention (2026), a quirky teen comedy from Washington State's Bainbridge Island, swaps the usual punishment for something harder: a room of kids made to talk about what is really happening behind closed doors. Writer-director Emma Cameron, who co-directed with her husband Mark Cameron and also plays the sleep-deprived Dr. Messerschmitt, joins Mike after the film's Pasadena International Film Festival screening and a summer theatrical run, just as it arrives on Amazon Prime and Apple TV. She traces the idea to The Breakfast Club (1985) and a job on a school mental-health commercial, explains why she cast 90 percent of the film in Washington, how she recast a major role two weeks before shooting, and how two nights of magic-hour light captured the final scene at the water's edge.

Follow Detention on Instagram and visit the film's official website.

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-projection-booth--5513239/support.

Become a supporter of The Projection Booth at http://www.patreon.com/projectionbooth 

The Projection Booth is part of the Weirding Way Media podcast network. Explore more of our shows at http://weirdingwaymedia.com.

A body missing for 36 years turns up at a gruesome crime scene, and the daughter who goes looking learns her father's past is much worse than she thought. The Cycle (2026), a Fantastic Fest world premiere starring Deborah Ann Woll and Jeffrey Donovan, comes from Jordan Downey, the filmmaker behind The Head Hunter (2018). Stephen King has already called it special, and it arrives on Shudder October 23.

Mike talks with Downey about the idea that consumed him and co-writer Kevin Stewart through the pandemic, protecting a twist as long as possible, shooting in weathered coastal Oregon locations, a body farm built from medical-grade bones, a life-cast practical corpse, and the Critters (1986) love-letter short he made hoping to land the reboot.

Follow Jordan Downey on Instagram.

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-projection-booth--5513239/support.

Become a supporter of The Projection Booth at http://www.patreon.com/projectionbooth 

The Projection Booth is part of the Weirding Way Media podcast network. Explore more of our shows at http://weirdingwaymedia.com.