With his 2017 break-out film Get Out, Jordan Peele took on the (literal) horrors of anti-Black racism. In 2018’s Us, he took aim at the cruelty of hierarchical class systems. Now, it appears the filmmaker has set his sights on the sexism that continues to plague women across the globe. He’s the SJW we both need and deserve right now.
Jordan will be co-producing the film, titled Sinkhole, with Insecure’s showrunner and shining star — Issa Rae. According to Deadline, Sinkhole will be “a thought-provoking genre movie that engages with questions of female perfection and identity.”
The film’s plot is said to be based on a 2016 short story of the same name by author Leyna Krow. In the original tale, a young family moves into their dream home, a beautiful house save for a mysterious, gaping sinkhole in the backyard. They soon discover that the hole has the ability to repair broken things, so perhaps it could fix a flawed person?
The author’s inspiration for the piece came from a writing group prompt; the writers were tasked with producing a short fairytale on the theme “I Married A Monster”. In the Deadline article announcing the production, Andreas Wiseman writes: “[Leyna] wanted to explore the notion of female perfection and was particularly interested in the ways society and cultures can promote the concept of women as imperfect or broken.”
You can read the story for free online here to get a feel for the spooky themes to be explored. Casting details are still very much up in the air, though rumours are buzzing that Issa Rae herself may also star in the film. Something tells us she won’t be rapping to herself in the mirror this time around.