New Englanders team up for horror thriller “Dead Whisper”

Samuel Dunning as Elliot Campbell in Dead. Whispers.” Photo courtesy of Vertical Entertainment

“Dead Whisper,” the new horror/thriller film from New Hampshire-born director Conor Soucy, premieres in Maine on Wednesday. 7 August at the Nickelodeon Cinema in Portland. Starring Brunswick native Samuel Dunning as Elliot Campbell, a man struggling with unimaginable grief who travels to an isolated New England island community overseen by the mysterious historian (Rob Evan), the film is a powerfully chilling meditation on death, grief and the lengths one will go to reclaim what has been lost – no matter the cost.

The reputation of the New England horror film “Dead Whisper” is beyond any doubt.

Soucy, making his directorial debut here, is from northern New Hampshire, and the disturbingly foggy and remote island that forms the central setting for “Dead Whisper” was filmed along the Massachusetts coast. Dunning (profiled in this column in 2022 for his astonishingly ambitious role as seven versions of the title character in the sci-fi comedy “Tim Travers & the Time Traveler’s Paradox”) was born and raised in Brunswick, and returns home frequently to see his mother — and to occasionally attend film premieres in Maine. “I’ll try to be at the screening,” said the busy actor Dunning (“Blue Bloods,” “Titans: The Rise of Hollywood,” “A Royal Christmas on Ice”) — “unless a job comes up.”

The inspiration for the story came from a dream.

Soucy says the film’s story of loss, grief and creeping fear was inspired by a particularly disturbing dream, as is the case with some of the best horror films. “It happened about two years ago,” said the director and screenwriter. “I woke up on an empty ferry that had been taken to a completely deserted island. I found a group of people speaking in whispers. It really scared me, and when I told people about the dream, almost everyone said, ‘You should make a movie out of that.’ The fact that a close relative died around the same time made me think of it as an interesting metaphor for grief, and the whole film is metaphorically about that.”

The film’s slowly building horror scenes are reminiscent of the 1970s.

In the film’s spookily effective trailer, Soucy skillfully manages to walk the line between too much while conveying how thoughtful and patient his film is with its scares. “It’s hard to prepare the film,” Soucy said of the film’s leisurely march toward its carefully placed scares. “It requires a level of patience from viewers that they’re probably not used to.”

Soucy cites classic horror and thriller films of a similar nature such as “Rosemary’s Baby,” “The Dialogue,” “The Gondolas in Black” and the films of Stanley Kubrick, and admits that some viewers had to get used to the film’s pace. “Some viewers turned the film off after about 30 minutes, not realizing that that’s when the big twist comes and the film becomes completely different,” he said, chuckling.

Dunning was Soucy’s first choice for the role of the brooding, subtly expressive Elliot.

“I don’t mean it as an insult when I say Sam was a natural fit for Elliot,” laughed Soucy of star Dunning’s role as the emotionally distant, internally tormented Elliot. “I’ve known Sam for about six years (the two worked together in the 2020 short drama A Parable of Winter), and he obviously has a real heart. As a protagonist, Sam had the difficult task of not saying much, but at the same time evoking sympathy for him. Still, there are moments when the real Sam’s personality shines through – like when Elliot is drinking – when you see someone who is more emotional and funnier.”

Samuel Dunning as Elliot Campbell in Dead. Whispers.” Photo courtesy of Vertical Entertainment

Filmmakers have reasons for wanting to scare you on the big screen.

Dunning, a Maine native, based his hopes for “Dead Whisper” on long-ago trips to the video store and Nickelodeon. “It’s like the days of VHS,” Dunning explains. “When you go to the video store and pay a few dollars, you want to get something for your money. There’s something about the tangible, when you look at the spine and the back of the box. It makes you feel connected.”

While Dunning and Soucy point out that the streaming service’s takeover gives independent filmmakers more opportunities to showcase their work, they agree that this model educates viewers to be less ambitious and more patient when it comes to films that aren’t all about action and scares. “It’s important to see these kinds of films in the theater,” Soucy said. “If you’re on the phone, you might miss an extremely important detail. With this film, if you pay attention to the first act, you’ll recognize a lot of things by the end. Seeing it in the theater is really the right way to see it.”

The nickname in particular has a special meaning for the star.

The actor says that young Sam’s visits to his parents’ jewelry studio in the Old Port allowed him to attend countless cheap matinees at the Nick Theater, and that seeing one of his own films there was a real thrill.

“I blame video stores like Videoport and theaters like Nick for making me an actor,” laughs Dunning, who now splits his time between acting centers in New York and Los Angeles. “Sneaking into a $2 R-rated show brought back so many formative memories, and it’s a great experience to have something I’m in there playing.” Soucy added, “I hope the people in Portland come out and give Sam a great homecoming day.”

The trailer for the film can be found on RottenTomatoesINDIE on YouTube. Tickets for the Portland screening are available at patriotcinemas.com.

Dennis Perkins is a freelance writer who lives in Auburn with his wife and cat.

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