“Don’t play Animal Crossing late at night…” says the description on Julian Terry’s short film Don’t Peek, which was made during quarantine last year. The short premiered at SXSW this year, and now Deadline reports that it will be expanded into a feature film by director Timur Bekmambetov, who’s known for his inventive and violent action films (including Wanted, Hardcore Henry, and Night Watch).
The premise of Don’t Peek is simple and disconcerting: an Animal Crossing player, alone in the dark, discovers that her actions in the game are affecting the world around her. It’s all fun and, uh, games, until there’s a creepy figure in the doorway of her Animal Crossing character’s home—and it wants into the real world. This is the point where I, a horror baby, stopped watching, but you can watch the whole thing above.
In an interview, Terry discussed the three-person team behind the short, and his inspiration: “One night while playing Animal Crossing, I actually creeped myself out and thought it would be a fun way to scare an audience with something that we trust and know well. We made sure to emphasize the claustrophobic feeling of something in your own bedroom haunting you.”
Bekmambetov’s feature version will doubtless be much bloodier. There’s no word yet on production, casting, or release date.
Buy the Book
Never Say You Can’t Survive
