Mike Flanagan is stepping into producer mode for a new body horror film called Rot, a psychological thriller about a trauma cleaner who slowly rots from the inside as the job forces him to face the grief he’s spent years running from. Matthew Lillard and Cooper Koch star, with Amber Midthunder rounding out the lead cast.
The story centers on an antisocial man with obsessive compulsions who is haunted by his hoarder mother’s death. He takes a specialized cleanup job hoping it will force him to confront the past he’s spent years avoiding, but the deeper he goes, the more his grief and compulsions begin to consume him.
Geo Bradley wrote the screenplay, which appeared on the 2024 Black List after she received the inaugural Blumhouse x K Period Media Screamwriting Fellowship. She describes the film as “Repulsion by way of Cronenberg.”
Rot will begin filming in Vancouver in November 2026, with Alexandra Magistro making her feature directing debut. Magistro has worked with Mike Flanagan‘s Red Room Pictures for about 8 years, beginning as his assistant on Doctor Sleep, The Haunting of Bly Manor, and The Midnight Club. She later produced The Fall of the House of Usher and The Life of Chuck and worked as a writer and producer on Flanagan’s upcoming Carrie series.
Flanagan is producing alongside Molly C. Quinn, Matthew M. Welty, and Elan Gale.
