‘Shazam!’ Director David F. Sandberg Returns To Horror With ‘The Culling’

Although David F. Sandberg only currently has three films under his belt, you can bet the guy has earned his buzzworthy status. Between his work on Shazam!, Lights Out, and Annabelle: Creation, Sandberg has cemented his place as one of the most noteworthy directors of today. And now, he has set his sights on a new terrifying project. According to Deadline, Lionsgate has just acquired the spec script for the horror The Culling and has put Sandberg at the helm.

Sandberg and his wife, Lotta Losten, will be producing The Culling via their newly formed Mångata production banner, alongside Good Fear Content’s Chris Bender & Jake Weiner. Scott Scoops is executive producing. Stephen Herman wrote the spec script. Lionsgate’s Aaron Janus is overseeing the project along with Aaron Edmonds.

The Culling circles around the tale of a troubled priest who secludes himself to a remote cabin in the middle of the woods where he attempts to make a last stand against the demon that terrorized his family when he was a child.

Sandberg’s most recent project was DC’s Shazam! for Warner Bros. The hit superhero film grossed over $366 million worldwide with Zachary Levi in the title role. Before he came on to bring the world big-budget horror features and superhero films though, Sandberg was known for his no-budget horror short films under the pseudonym ponysmasher. He released these projects on both Vimeo and YouTube.

What really started it all was his the 2 minute and 42-second terrifying short movie Lights Out which Sandberg released in 2013. The film was a viral success and garnered millions of views worldwide. This soon led him to his debut feature of the same title. Lights Out, which premiered in 2016, was a box office hit grossing $148 million on a $5 million budget. In 2017, Sandberg went onto direct his next horror with Anabelle: Creation, the prequel to the Anabelle, the fourth film in The Conjuring Universe.

This year, Sandberg proved his ultimate love for horror. Even in quarantine, the director and his wife released the two horror shorts Shadowed and Not Alone In Here. Aside from The Culling, Sandberg is also set to direct a film adaptation of The Unsound  for Netflix and he’s also working on the second installment of Shazam!. Sandberg is also executive producing an adaptation of Fear Agent for Amazon.