Say what you will about the 2013 horror anthology The ABCs Of Death—our own Tasha Robinson did in her review—but you’ve got to admit it was a bold experiment. And producers Ant Timpson and Tim League (the latter of whom is also the CEO of the Alamo Drafthouse) are once again upping the ante with their new venture, The Field Guide To Evil. It’s another horror anthology film, this one loosely based around the idea of “dark folklore”—tales of witches and goblins and assorted flesh-eating beasties told for centuries by parents trying to keep their kids from wandering off into the woods like the little idiots they are.
Thankfully for those who felt that The ABCs Of Death’s inclusion of 26 shorts from 26 directors resulted in a film that was all over the place tonally, The Field Guide To Evil will have only eight segments. Directors have been recruited from all over the world, with a special emphasis on central Europe, birthplace of Grimm‘s Fairy Tales. Those directors and countries are: Austria (Veronika Franz & Severin Fiala, Goodnight Mommy), Germany (Katrin Gebbe, Nothing Bad Can Happen), Greece (Yannis Veslemes, Norway), Hungary (Peter Strickland, The Duke Of Burgundy), India (Ashim Ahluwalia, Miss Lovely), Poland (Agnieszka Smoczynska, The Lure), Turkey (Can Evrenol, Baskin), and the United States (Calvin Reeder, The Rambler).
The film promises to take a darker approach to fairy tales, but the truly unusual thing about it is its approach to crowdfunding. Along with traditional perks for those who donate to the film on Indiegogo, Timpson and League are offering equity for online investors, basically meaning that if you give $100 or more, and the resulting film makes money, you’re entitled to a share of the profits on the back end. To prove they’re serious, the team has offered detailed financials on The Field Guide To Evil’s MicroVentures investment page. Hot tub parties and other fringe benefits of telling people you’re a movie producer are not included.