With roles in Barbarian, It, and John Wick: Chapter 4, Bill Skarsgard has gained his fame by exploring his creepy side. A far cry from his brother Alex and father Stellan, whose careers have taken a slightly different route. But it’s all coming together for Bill, too, and his next film, Boy Kills World, a pulpy B-movie revenge flick compared by some to The Raid, could be what makes him the Skarsgard everyone is talking about.
It doesn’t take long to see where comparisons to The Raid come from. Set in a post-apocalyptic society, Skarsgard plays a man seeking violent revenge against the matriarch of an elite dynasty for killing his family and leaving him deaf and mute as a child. The action sequences are fast, over-the-top violent like something out of a video game, and even feature martial arts killer Yayan Ruhian who starred in The Raid 1 & 2.
Also joining Skarsgard in the cast are Happy Death Day‘s Jessica Rothe, Michelle Dockery, Famke Janssen, Sharlto Copley, Brett Gelman, Isaiah Mustafa, and Andrew Koji.
The film is directed by Moritz Mohr from a script by Arend Remmers and Tyler Burton Smith. Sam Raimi is aboard as one of the producers.
Here’s the synopsis: Skarsgård stars as “Boy” who vows revenge after his family is murdered by Hilda Van Der Koy (Janssen), the deranged matriarch of a corrupt post-apocalyptic dynasty that left the boy orphaned, deaf and voiceless. Driven by his inner voice, one which he co-opted from his favorite childhood video game, Boy trains with a mysterious shaman (Ruhian) to become an instrument of death and is set loose on the eve of the annual culling of dissidents. Bedlam ensues as Boy commits bloody martial arts mayhem, inciting a wrath of carnage and blood-letting. As he tries to get his bearings in this delirious realm, Boy soon falls in with a desperate resistance group, all the while bickering with the apparent ghost of his rebellious little sister.
Boy Kills World opens in theaters on April 26th.
