The ‘Trees Are Watching’ in Chilling First Trailer; Premiering at TIFF!

The Toronto International Film Festival just added another horror movie to our must-see list.

Trees Are Watching, the latest from acclaimed Iranian Kurdish filmmaker Bahman Ghobadi, will have its World Premiere as part of TIFF’s Centrepiece programme next month. Eva Green (Dark Shadows) stars in the psychological horror film, and we also have our first look and a seriously chilling trailer.

There isn’t much plot revealed in the trailer itself, but there doesn’t need to be. It’s basically a lightning rod of creepy imagery, slowly building a mystery filled with supernatural horror and some seriously unsettling visuals. The whole thing is unbelievably eerie and should send chills up your spine and goosebumps down your arms.

According to TIFF programmer Peter Kuplowsky, the film follows Darya (Eva Green), a writer who returns to her hometown of Mardin with her deaf daughter and becomes haunted by memories of twin sisters Spin and Nihal.

Their former family home now sits amid mass deforestation, with only two ominous trees remaining. Things get considerably stranger when Darya begins receiving nightly visits from a seemingly ordinary wooden chair that may be anything but.

Kuplowsky describes the film as blending “psychological horror with local myth,” while teasing surreal set pieces, supernatural horror, and even “full-blown Grand Guignol spectacle.” He also singles out one sequence that recalls the Final Destination franchise.

Kuplowsky also praises Green’s performance as “extraordinary,” describing Trees Are Watching as a mixture of the “provocative and poignant” with the “funny and frightening.”

Check out the first image and chilling trailer below.