“The Substance” distributor MUBI has acquired Sundance favorite “Lurker” following a highly competitive bidding war and will release the movie in theaters later this year. The film will receive its international premiere at the 2025 Berlinale.
The film, which made its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival this year, tells the story of a retail employee who infiltrates the inner circle of a music artist on the verge of stardom. But, “as he gets closer to the budding music star, access and proximity become a matter of life and death.”
Writer and director Alex Russell has been part of major shows like “Dave” and “The Bear,” but “Lurker” marks his feature directorial debut.
“It was already such a privilege to show our movie at Sundance last week. I’m honestly still reeling and recovering from that experience” said director Russell in an official statement. “To have found such an ideal partner in MUBI and get the chance to bring it wider feels like an added bonus.”
In her review of the film, TheWrap’s Ronda Racha Penrice wrote: “Lurker” is a deep meditation on male self-worth in the vein of Joaquin Phoenix in the “Joker” franchise, only more realistic. While the film poses more questions than it does solutions, Russell succeeds in expanding awareness and conversation around male displacement and longing for belonging.
Starring Théodore Pellerin, Archie Madekwe, Havana Rose Liu, Sunny Suljic, Zack Fox and Daniel Zolghadri, the story started as just one scene that Russell wrote during the pandemic, as he observed real-life interactions his own friends had in the music industry.
“And then COVID just kept going. So I kept writing it, and then it became a 100-page script,” Russell said at TheWrap’s Sundance Studio presented by World of Hyatt. “And here it is. Here we are.”
