Los Angeles-based genre label Spooky Pictures, Abu Dhabi-based studio Image Nation and L.A. and UAE-based production company Longevity Pictures have secured a financing deal with prominent European production/distribution banner Studiocanal — through its in-house genre label Sixth Dimension — for their upcoming horror thriller “Home Safety Hotline.”
“Home Safety Hotline,” which is set to start production in South Africa in early 2027, is based on Night Signal Entertainment’s critically acclaimed puzzle video game of the same name. Durban-born Michael Matthews (“Love and Monsters”) (pictured above) will direct from a screenplay written by Nick Tassoni (“Lure”). The film is being produced by Steven Schneider (“Late Night With the Devil”) for Spooky Pictures, alongside Majd Nassif (“Mercy”) for Longevity Pictures and Kameek Lucas Taitt (“Love and Monsters”).
For Studiocanal, boarding “Home Safety Hotline” underlines the company’s commitment to the South African industry following the recent acquisition of local pay-TV outfit The MultiChoice Group by its parent company Canal+.
The executive producers on “Home Safety Hotline” comprise Image Nation’s Ben Ross (“Watcher”), Jakob Pollack (“Weapons”) of Spooky Pictures and Jed Benedict, who is head of Sixth Dimension.
The film, set in the U.S., “will follow an unemployed loner who must take a job as a phone operator at a mysterious home security company, only to realize they specialize in protecting customers from horrific monsters that come out at night,” according to the synopsis.
“Home Safety Hotline” will now be co-developed and co-financed by Sixth Dimension, which will also handle worldwide sales and release the film theatrically across Studiocanal’s territory footprint of the U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Benelux, Poland, Australia and New Zealand.
“What we love about Home Safety Hotline is how it takes the most ordinary corners of a home: the walls, the basement, the thing in the attic, and turns them genuinely terrifying, then runs the whole nightmare through a struggling company and the unlikely people holding it together. It’s fun, it’s scary, and it’s unlike anything out there,” said Longevity Pictures president Nassif. “Alongside our partners at Spooky Pictures and Image Nation, and with the support of Studiocanal’s Sixth Dimension, we’ve found exactly the right team to bring it to life.”
Commented Sixth Dimension head Benedict: “Just as every night I hope the eerie humming downstairs comes from my cheap refrigerator, every day I hope a project like ‘Home Safety Hotline’ crosses our radar. From the moment our good friends at Spooky Pictures, Image Nation and Longevity Pictures first spoke of Night Signal Entertainment’s cult game (of the same name), we knew we wanted to be involved. And when we learned that Michael Matthews would be directing — an exceptional filmmaker and a proven monster-whisperer himself — with Nick Tassoni devising our handbook through hell, it became impossible to resist.”
