‘Gaia’ will debut on Showmax this Halloween 31 October. Images: Supplied.
Horror film ‘Gaia’ is set in the Tsitsikamma National Park and follows an injured forest ranger on a routine mission.
‘Gaia’ will debut on Showmax this Halloween 31 October. Images: Supplied.
Set in the Tsitsikamma National Park, Gaia will debut on Showmax this Halloween 31 October.
Horror film Gaia debuts on Showmax this Halloween – 31 October. The breakout South African horror film follows an injured forest ranger on a routine mission (Monique Rockman) who is saved by two off-the-grid survivalists Carel Nel and Alex van Dyk).
However, what starts out as a welcome rescue grows suspicious as the son and his renegade father reveal a cultish devotion to the forest. When their cabin is attacked by a strange being, it’s clear there is a far greater threat in this unrelenting wilderness.
Gaia is set close to home, at the Tsitsikamma National Park. The horror film won the following awards at Silwerskerm:
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Gaia was released in cinemas, on Hulu and via video on demand in North America last year by Decal. The ecological horror has a 85% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
Gaia is a breakthrough for director Jaco Bouwer, who was up for Best Director and won Best TV Drama at the 2022 SAFTAs for 4 Mure, a five-part kykNET series set in the same hotel room, but with different stories in different genres each episode. 4 Mure is now available to binge on Showmax.
A week into filming Gaia, production was halted due to the outbreak of Covid. They only resumed shooting three months later.
“Suddenly what was fiction became a strange form of reality and our pre-apocalyptic film started to resonate more with cast and crew,” said Bouwer.
“We experience a searing grief and horror when the collapse flickers into view… I don’t think the performances in Gaia would’ve had the same emotional undercurrent if it wasn’t for the pandemic and its interruption into our work.”
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