The Latest Trailer For Guillermo Del Toro's Nightmare Alley Is Full Of Spooks And Scares
It's been some time since Guillermo Del Toro has graced audiences with his usual brand of fantastical horror. The director's unique style of blending these two genres is as haunting as it is beautiful. "Nightmare Alley" is Del Toro's newest project starring Bradley Cooper and Cate Blanchett. There is no sign of Doug Jones, who is Del Toro's favorite monster, according to Vulture. The director's monster appreciation does not appear in the new film because the subject material is a novel — not one of Del Toro's designs. Even though "Nightmare Alley" is different from every other Del Toro film, some themes remain.
This film will be less horrific than his previous work, but magical realism still seems prevalent, judging from the new trailer that dropped today. The film is based on the 1946 noir novel written by William Lindsay Gresham. Del Toro is committed to staying faithful to the source material, which the director told Vanity Fair is gritty and strangely magical. We're finally getting a sense of what all that means in the new trailer for the film.
Nightmare Alley is scary because it's real
The new trailer for "Nightmare Alley" is mysterious and withholding, just like the main characters. Bradley Cooper plays Stanton Carlisle, a talented man working at a carnival whose abilities involve manipulating people. It is unclear whether these powers are mystical or just insidious manipulation like Cate Blanchett's Lilith Ritter, the psychiatrist Stan is in cahoots with.
Stan's circumstances become more dire as he continues with Ritter and encounters a nameless corporation that questions him about his talents. Though there are no overarching horror elements, there is something scarier about the nature of people. People are the reason that Stan becomes entrenched in life-threatening circumstances. Ritter already appears to be a conniving villainess who is the cause of the strife in the trailer. Fans may be hoping for overt horror elements, but the "Nightmare Alley" trailer contains subtle terror that is just as frightening. This noir tale is scary because of its realism. Instead of outright supernatural horror, the film questions the American Dream in this gritty story. Only time will tell how this will rank on Guillermo Del Toro's list of movies. "Nightmare Alley" will hit theaters on December 17.