Joe Russo‘s “Soul Mates” and Natalie Hanson’s “Safe and Sound” are among the projects included on horror genre guru Kailey Marsh’s 2016 BloodList of the most-liked screenplays and pilots in horror, thriller, dark comedy and sci-fi.
The seventh annual list, announced Wednesday and based on a survey of 74 industry executives, was topped by “Orb,” written by Steve Desmond and Michael Sherman.
Other scripts include “Man Alive” by Joe Greenberg, Daniel Erickson’s pilot “Severance” and Zach Ford’s “The Watcher.”
This is also the first year of #FreshBloodSelects, which sheds light on new writers and scripts in Hollywood. There were 386 submissions.
The #FreshBloodSelects includes feature thriller “An October Wedding,” written by Nate Ruegger, and Rachel Woolley’s horror feature, “Fraud is Dead.”
Marsh is a rising manager-producer who compiles the BloodList each year and has seen its profile soar over the last eight years. Screenplays previously featured on the BloodList include “Arrival,” “Autopsy of Jane Doe,” “The Shallows” and “The Boy Next Door,” which starred Jennifer Lopez.
Check out this year’s BloodList below.
Title: “ORB”
Writer: Steve Desmond & Michael Sherman
Logline: Inspired by actual events from a phenomenon that occurred in 1974, the story follows a young married couple who discover a mysterious metallic orb in the woods near their house following a meteor shower. While the unusual object dazzles the couple by exhibiting some awe-inspiring properties, its true purpose is revealed to be far more sinister than they could ever imagine.
Genre: Sci-fi Horror
Title: “Man Alive”
Writer: Joe Greenberg
Logline: After an alien invasion takes over the minds of humankind, one survivor known as “Man” must make peace with this alien to fight a greater evil.
Genre: Sci-Fi, Horror
Title: “Severance” (Pilot)
Writer: Daniel Erickson
Logline: Data analyst Mark Scout heads up a team of pencil-pushers, each of whom has had their memories surgically split between work and home life. After a colleague goes missing, Mark begins to see the company’s dangerous secret agenda, and must try to contact his “outside” self to help take them down forever.
Genre: Sci-Fi Mystery/Thriller
Title: “The Watcher”
Writer: Zack Ford
Logline: When a couple living in a Brooklyn high-rise think that a man in the building across the street is looking through their window, their paranoia grows until they begin to suspect he might actually be a killer at large who the news refers to as The Headhunter.
Genre: Horror
Title: “Soul Mates”
Writer: Chris LaMont & Joe Russo
Logline: Based on a short story by Frankie Mendoza, Gunnar Baroldy and JJ Chalupnik. The film is about two unsuspecting strangers who find themselves participants in a twisted new dating service that forces two singles inside a nightmarish maze designed to help them find their Soul Mate – or die trying.
Genre: Horror/Thriller
Title: “I Think We’re Alone Now”
Writer: Mike Makowsky
Logline: The apocalypse proves a blessing in disguise for one lucky recluse — until a second survivor arrives with the threat of companionship.
Genre: Sci-Fi Dark Comedy
Title: “The Live Ones”
Writer: Alex Carl
Logline: A San Francisco attorney inherits a house in upstate New York that contains the dark secrets of the family she never knew. Tonally like the SKELETON KEY, but with haunted mannequins.
Genre: Horror
Title: “Maximum King”
Writer: Shay Hatten
Logline: An outlandish, surreal imagining of how in 1985, Stephen King wrote and directed his horror classic MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE.
Genre: Dark Comedy
Title: “Summer of ’84”
Writers: Matt Leslie & Stephen J. Smith
Logline:It’s the summer of 1984, the perfect time to be 14 years old and free. But when neighborhood conspiracy theorist Davey Armstrong begins to suspect his police officer neighbor might be the serial killer all over the local news, he and his three best friends begin an investigation that soon turns dangerous.
Genre: Thriller, Suspense, Horror, Coming-of-Age
Title: “Safe and Sound”
Writer: Natalie Hanson
Logline: A new mother hears voices through her baby monitor, discovering a secret that threatens to destroy her.
Genre: Horror
2016 Fresh Blood Selects
Project Name: “A Lot of Blood” (Feature)
Writer(s): Justin Di Sandro
Logline: After two friends leave the bar after a night of drinking, they discover their car missing from the parking lot, an RV in its place, and a woman trapped inside.
Genre(s): Horror, Thriller
Project Name: “An October Wedding” (Feature)
Writer(s) Name: Nate Ruegger
Genre(s): Thriller
Logline: A runaway comes home for her sister’s wedding only to suspect that one of the guests is a killer who knows her darkest secret: she, and everyone in her family, is a witch.
Project Name: “Atrophy” (Feature)
Writer(s): Jennifer Helen Coates
Genre(s): Thriller
Logline: Centers on a NYPD detective who struggles with black periods in her memory. With this, she soon discovers that the prime suspect in a serial killer case is herself.
Project Name: “The Bridge Partner” (Short Film)
Writer(s): Gabriel Olson, based on the short story by Peter S. Beagle
Genre(s): Horror, Thriller
Logline: A mousey housewife hoping to make friends at her bridge club is paired with a mysterious newcomer she comes to think is trying to kill her.
Project Name: “The Bullshit Boys” (Feature)
Writer(s): Nick Shepherd & Toni Shepherd
Genre(s): Horror
Logline: A young man and his buddies host a local vodcast called ‘The Bullshit Boys’, where they debunk or as they’d say, “call shit”, on local folklore. Only this time, they’ve opened a bridge between our world and the realm of nightmares.
Project Name: “Darwin’s Game” (Feature)
Writer(s) Name: Connor McKnight
Genre(s): Horror, Thriller
Logline: Eight strangers wake up in an eerily exquisite hunting lodge, only to unknowingly become the prey in a “specialized” commercial gaming facility. “The Cabin in the Woods” meets “The Purge”.
Project Name: “Fraud is Dead” (Feature)
Writer(s): Rachel Woolley
Genre(s): Horror
Logline: In 1870, famous American mediums, “The Fox Sisters”, admit their fraud and publicly deny the existence of spirits, forcing them to rely only on each other (and a mixed bag of parlor tricks) when, while fleeing the country by ship, they’re suddenly terrorized by vengeful ghosts.
Project Name: “Goldie” (Feature)
Writer(s) Name: Brett Martin
Genre(s): Horror, Thriller
Logline: A female serial killer with a penchant for porridge stalks a true crime author she wants to write her life story. The most famous home invader in fairy tale history has never gotten her own movie, until now. But my Goldie doesn’t run away when the “bears” come home and if you’re not just right for her, you’re dead.
Project Name: “Let the Devil Out” (Feature)
Writer(s): Ryan Jackson
Genre(s): Horror, Sci-Fi, Dark Comedy
Logline: A containment team boards an offshore drilling platform in the South Pacific after an oil spill, only to discover it’s a black site developing experimental weapons thats crew has been wiped out by a bio engineered contagion – one that causes those it infects heads to spontaneously explode. “Scanners” on an oil rig.
Project Name: “Skin & Bones” (Pilot)
Writer(s): Paul Portis
Genre(s): Horror, Thriller, Dark Comedy
Logline: 16 year old Reagan is placed in a mental institution after her newborn son is stolen by a vengeful witch on Halloween night and dragged to the pits of hell. Along with the help of her misfit friends, Reagan will have to prove her sanity while battling a demonic cult, dark forces and a coven of Witches, stopping at nothing to get her son back!
Project Name: “The Stricken” (Feature)
Writer(s): Rob Pilkington
Genre(s): Horror
Logline: When an unpopular young sheriff discovers an abandoned train stalled, robbed, and teaming with leprous undead, he must pursue the charismatic bandit who carries both the stolen loot and a deadly germ.
Project Name: “24/7 Xpress Cleaning” (Pilot)
Writer(s): Raul de Miguel
Genre(s): Thriller, Dark Comedy
Logline: A perpetually unemployed guy who faints at the sight of blood and his ex-con sister-in-law start a cleaning business, but an unexpected twist leads them to become the new cleanup crew for the local mob.
Project Name: “The 49th Day” (Feature)
Writer(s): Craig Peters
Genre(s): Horror
Logline: A young girl’s imaginary friend starts killing her family off one by one. But what can you do when you’re only nine and Death wants to play?