‘Queen Mary’ Horror Finds Captain in ‘Dracula Untold’ Director Gary Shore
A horror feature inspired by the legendary alleged haunting of real-life ocean liner the Queen Mary is finally setting sail, The Hollywood Reporter has learned, with the upcoming project due to dock first at the European Film Market in Berlin next month.
Gary Shore, who made a major box office splash with 2014’s Dracula Untold, has been tapped to helm The Queen Mary. Rocket Science is fully financing the project and also representing worldwide sales.
Developed by Brett Tomberlin, the film will be produced by Nigel Sinclair and Nicholas Ferrall of White Horse Pictures (The Woman in Black, The Beatles: Eight Days A Week), Brett Tomberlin (Winchester) for Imagination Design Works and Thorsten Schumacher and Lars Sylvest for Rocket Science (Resistance).
Tobin Armbrust will executive produce together with White Horse’s Cassidy Hartmann. Andy Trapani, Brian Gilbert and Steve Sheldon of Epic Entertainment Group will also serve as executive producers. White Horse Pictures’ Jeanne Elfant Festa will co-executive produce. Tom Vaughan and Jordan Rambis will co-produce. Mali Elfman is producing and Mark Tomberlin is executive producing as part of Imagination Design Works.
Described by Time magazine as “One of the world’s most haunted places,” the RMS Queen Mary was one of the first ships built by the Cunard-White Star Line. Unlike its infamous predecessor, Titanic, this ship survived a tidal wave, a mid-ocean collision, sabotage attempts and Hitler placing a $250,000 bounty to sink her during WWII.
However, after being retired and docking permanently in Long Beach, California in 1967, there were claims that the ship was haunted, with one of the staterooms alleged to contain the spirit of a person supposedly murdered there. It now operates attraction experiences based around this legend.
The upcoming film will center around photographers Erin and Patrick, who are brought aboard the vessel with their young son Lukas and unleash a series of events that entwines their family with the ship’s dark past.
According to The Queen Mary‘s synopsis, as the terror unfolds around the family they begin to realize there is more to this sumptuous ocean liner than meets the eye: its remarkable legacy masking violent secrets. As Erin and Patrick uncover the haunted layers that the vast ship contains, it becomes increasingly clear that there is only one way out for them — to go even deeper.
The Queen Mary will be the first horror film to be shot on board the actual real-life ship.
