Venice First Look: Jena Malone in Carter Smith’s Queer Midnight Movie ‘Swallowed’ (Exclusive)

Jena Malone in ‘Swallowed’

Courtesy of All The Dead Boys

Jena Malone looks to have lost all hope in this exclusive first look from queer midnight movie Swallowed from three-time Sundance alumni Carter Smith, reuniting the Neon Demon and Hunger Games star with the director 13 years after their supernatural horror, The Ruins.

Shot under the radar with a small production footprint in rural Maine, the film is a story of friendship and small-town alienation that follows two best friends on their final night together, as it spirals into a backwoods nightmare of drugs, bugs and horrific intimacy. The film is being presented to U.S. buyers at Venice by ICM, and is currently available for foreign rights.

Alongside Malone, Swallowed also stars Mark Patton (Scream, Queen! My Nightmare On Elm Street), Cooper Koch (Less Than Zero, Power Book II: Ghost), and newcomer Jose Colõn, and is the spiritual Smith’s short film Bugcrush, which won a Grand Jury Prize at Sundance in 2006.

“Swallowed is the movie I wish I’d had as a horror loving queer kid growing up in rural maine – with all the blood, sweat and tears of a classic midnight movie,” said writer/director/producer Smith, also behind Jamie Marks is Dead, which premiered at Sundance in 2014.

Smith wrote, directed and produced on behalf of his company All The Dead Boys, along with Witchcraft Motion Picture Company’s producers Ross O’Connor (Premature) and Noah Lang (The Climb).

Malone is represented by The Gersh Agency, and Cooper Koch is represented by Innovative Artists and Silver Lining Entertainment.

This story first appeared in The Hollywood Reporter’s Sept. 3 daily issue at the Venice International Film Festival.