After hearing that a sequel to 2009’s strange horror smash Orphan wouldn’t arrive until 2020, fans aren’t having it! The prequel Orphan: First Kill, which hits cinemas in August and serves as an enticing appetiser for the scary season, will see Isabelle Fuhrman reprise her classic breakout role as Esther, the killer lady disguised as a child. In addition to the first theatrical teaser, which was shown by Paramount Pictures Studios, fresh photos have been revealed, showing how the production team was able to bring a young Esther back to the big screen in a hauntingly real way. It was more than a decade ago when Jaume Collet-Serra (director of DCEU’s Black Adam) made Orphan, a horror film in which a little girl, Esther (Fuhrman), haunted her new adoptive family soon after the tragic loss of their pregnant child.
As it turned out, their nine-year-old daughter was actually a 33-year-old woman named Leena, who was also a serial murderer, as depicted by Vera Farmiga and Peter Sarsgaard in the film. Yikes. Director William Brent Bell (The Devil Inside) is bringing Fuhrman back for a prequel that examines how Leena became 9-year-old Esther, in an attempt to produce something unprecedented in film. A young adult impersonating a 33-year-old lady pretending to be a youngster is a mind-bender. “We didn’t employ any insane cosmetic methods,” Fuhrman claimed in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, and it’s hard to believe that after seeing the photographs of young Esther, he actually meant it.
Orphan: First Kill’s director, Fuhrman, had this to say after watching the completed film: “I was there every single day. ‘ I know how we pulled this off. Every technique in the book is working on me, but it’s making me feel like a nine-year-old again, which is beyond bizarre. I thought to myself, “How do I revisit this role while also credibly portraying a child? ” It was the difficult aspect of attempting to be an adult last time that was the easy part. It’s time to pretend to be a kid again. When Leena Fuhrman escapes from an Estonian mental institution, she assumes Tricia Albright’s identity as the mother of a lost kid named Esther. Julia Stiles will be reprising her role as Tricia Albright in First Kill.
Stiles appears terrified as she clutches a butcher knife in her hands, divided between her love for her long-lost kid and her growing fear that Esther isn’t who she claims to be. Stiles may have a tough time exposing Leena’s scary performance between Rossif Sutherland as Esther’s father Allen Albright, who is depicted cradling his daughter in a close hug. There should be no disconnect between First Kill and Orphan, as the script by David Coggeshall (Scream: The TV Series) is an adaptation of the original Orphan narrative by David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick and Alex Mace. Donnan is joined in the cast by Hiro Kanagawa (Donnan), Matthew Finlan (Finlan), Lauren Cochrane (Cochrane) and others.
On August 19, Orphan: First Kill will be available in cinemas, on DVD, and on Paramount+ for streaming.
Orphan’s official plot summary states:
In this horrific prequel to the original and stunning horror sensation, Orphan, Esther’s tragic journey continues. After successfully escaping from an Estonian psychiatric clinic, Esther travels to the United States under the guise of a wealthy family’s lost daughter. In a twist, she is pitted against a mother who would do anything to defend her family from the “kid.”