‘Perpetrator’: First-Look Clip Of Berlin-Bound Feminist Horror Starring Alicia Silverstone

EXCLUSIVE: Fresh from reprising her seminal Clueless role for a TV spot during the Super Bowl, Alicia Silverstone heads to Berlin this year with Perpetrator, a horror-tinged genre mashup from filmmaker Jennifer Reeder.

Written and directed by Reeder, the pic follows Jonny, a wild and impulsive teenage girl living precariously in a town where young women continue to go missing, and the power she’s forced to unlock to survive.

The full synopsis reads: Jonny Baptiste is a reckless teen sent to live with her estranged Aunt Hildie. On her 18th birthday, she experiences a radical metamorphosis: a family spell that redefines her called Forevering. When several teen girls go missing at her new school, a mythically feral Jonny goes after the Perpetrator.

The film will screen in the Panorama section in Berlin.

Alicia Silverstone plays Hildie in the pic. The full cast is rounded out by Kiah McKirnan (Mare of Easttown), Christopher Lowell (My Best Friend’s Exorcism), Melanie Liburd (The Idol), and Ireon Roach (Candyman [2021]). Producers are Gregory Chambet for WTFilms and Derek Bishé for Divide/Conquer.

Trevor Groth and Sarah Hong executive produced for 30West (Triangle Of Sadness), along with Adam Hendricks and Greg Gilreath for Divide/Conquer, Dimitri Stephanides for WTFilms as well as Emily Gotto for Shudder.

Shudder has acquired the pic for the US, Canada, the UK, Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand. WTFilms is handling sales for all remaining territories and will launch at EFM.

Perpetrator is Reeder’s second feature to screen at Berlinale following her 2019 break-out Knives And Skin, which IFC Midnight released theatrically and marks her third collaboration with Shudder, following Night’s End (2022), featuring Michael Shannon, and the 2021 anthology V/H/S/94.

Reeder was also named one of Bong Joon Ho’s 20 upcoming directors for the 2020s.

“Perpetrator is about a teenage girl with profound capabilities in a world where female friendship is the only survival strategy,” Reeder said of the pic.

“Making so many films about the experiences of girls and women has taught me that we are obsessed with youth and beauty, especially among teenagers, and yet we have built a cultural machine to annihilate them.”

She added: “My film is about this paradox and offers a course correction. Although it presents a specific kind of American angle, it feels entirely appropriate for it to premiere at the Berlin Film Festival. In my direct experiences, audiences outside of the US have a keen ability to translate the particulars of my storytelling. These audiences are in for a wild ride with Perpetrator. Brace yourselves.”

Check out the full clip above.