It’s not easy selling a movie that depends on its show-stopping twist. Studios have long struggled to find the perfect balance for promotion, walking a thin line between teasing their target audience and providing enough context to court genuine interest. It’s a struggle that New Line Cinema, producer Zach Cregger (Barbarian), and first-time director Drew Hancock are now navigating with Companion, a romantic horror comedy that, until very recently, no one knew much about.
The first teaser revealed very little about Companion’s plot. It introduced Sophie Thatcher (Yellowjackets, Heretic) and Jack Quaid (The Boys) as a toxic couple. It also drew a few not-so-subtle parallels to two of the studio’s past films, The Notebook and Barbarian. Beyond that, however, there wasn’t much to glean. Had Hancock had his way, audiences might have been in the dark until Companion hit theaters. But with its release date fast approaching, New Line is finally cluing us into the film's premise, and it’s got a lot more to do with Ex Machina or The Stepford Wives than with The Notebook.
