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A USEFUL GHOST: “March is mourning his wife Nat who has recently passed away due to dust pollution. He discovers her spirit has returned by possessing a vacuum cleaner. Disturbed by a ghost that appeared after a worker’s death shut down their factory, his family reject their unconventional human-ghost relationship. Trying to convince them of their love, Nat offers to cleanse the factory. To become a useful ghost, she must first get rid of the useless ones.”
DIRECTED BY Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke
STARRING Davika Hoorne, Witsarut Himmarat, Apasiri Nitibhon, Wanlop Rungkumjud, and Wisarut Homhuan
IN THEATERS JANUARY 16TH
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Grindhouse Releasing Resurrects Palmer Rockey’s SCARLET WARNING 666: “Move over, Ed Wood and Tommy Wiseau: Grindhouse Releasing is about to put moviegoers through Hell in SCARLET WARNING 666, the legendary, long-lost Dallas disasterpiece starring do-it-all writer/director/crooner Palmer Rockey.
Hailed as “one of the most fascinating underground characters ever” (Forced Exposure), Rockey boasted of playing 7 different roles on screen and 47 different roles behind the scenes in what is reputed to be the worst film ever made.
The new restoration of SCARLET WARNING 666 will have its world premiere on January 20, 2026, at the Texas Theatre in Dallas.
Originally titled IT HAPPENED ONE WEEKEND, SCARLET WARNING 666 features Rockey as twin brothers entangled with Satanic skullduggery and bizarre occult rituals on a country estate.
Rockey expected Academy Award recognition for his efforts. After his ‘action suspense thriller’ was laughed off the screen at its ill-fated Dallas premiere in 1974, he refused to give up.
Rockey spent decades obsessively laboring over his magnum opus. He filmed new scenes, piling layer upon layer of cringe in a doomed effort to explain the incomprehensible plot. Rockey distributed the film himself, four-walling theaters to exhibit his epic in various incarnations as IT HAPPENED ON SUNDAY, SCARLET LOVE, ROCKEY’S STYLE, LOVE IS DEEP INSIDE, and SCARLET WARNING 666.
In 1980 Rockey released the film with an original “Movie Album” featuring his own vocal stylings. When this too met with audience mockery, Rockey attempted to frame the unintended laughs as “satire.”
Doug Smith, a.k.a. the Reverend Ivan Stang, co-founder of the Church of the SubGenius, saw Rockey’s movie during its theatrical run in Dallas as SCARLET LOVE. Stang couldn’t believe the insane display of incompetence on the screen, and evangelized for years about the film.
The Rockey legend grew when the SCARLET LOVE soundtrack was featured in the popular RE/Search book series INCREDIBLY STRANGE MUSIC during an interview with Jello Biafra, who described Rockey as a “disco lounge-lizard from Hell.” The ultra-rare LP became an obsession for record collectors, ultimately leading to a 2013 reissue in the UK.
Critics praised the album as outsider art, and Carl Broemel (My Morning Jacket) covered one of Rockey’s songs from the film. “Longing for You” is an attempt to revive a somewhat corny song by an enigmatic and shifty movie entrepreneur named Palmer Rockey. Rockey’s unfinished film has disappeared, but the remaining soundtrack is a rare cult classic of oddball music.”’ (Broadway World)
Although he never nabbed his hoped-for Oscar, Rockey ended up Oscar-adjacent: his final cut of SCARLET WARNING 666 was found in the Academy vault and restored by Academy Award-winning film editor Bob Murawski of Grindhouse Releasing.
To release SCARLET WARNING 666, Grindhouse Releasing has partnered with Rockey’s long-suffering widow Cookie (Mary Ann) Rockey, who financed Rockey’s misbegotten dream project by working double shifts at the U.S. Post Office. Cookie’s memoir THE ROCK: THE LIFE AND CRIMES OF PALMER ROCKEY is a must-read account of her surreal experiences on the outermost fringes of independent filmmaking.
“It seems to me that the real story is in the mental and to some extent moral decline of Palmer Rockey which is exhibited in the final version of the film,” said Dr. Ron DiSalvo, who played opposite Rockey in scenes filmed decades apart.
Now, at last, Palmer Rockey’s epic returns to Dallas for the world premiere of the restored SCARLET WARNING 666. Tickets are on sale now at the Texas Theatre.”
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NEON NABS GLOBAL RIGHTS TO ALEXANDER ULLOM’S DIRECTORIAL DEBUT IT ENDS: “NEON, the award-winning studio behind some of the most daring and celebrated films of the last nine years, announced today it has acquired world-wide rights to Alexander Ullom’s directorial debut It Ends. Starring Mitchell Cole, Akira Jackson, Noah Toth, and Phinehas Yoon, the film premiered in competition to critical acclaim at SXSW 2025. NEON will release the film theatrically in 2026.
The film is produced by Carrie Carusone and Evan Barber along with production companies Above .330, Aymara Films, Please Hold Pictures, and Snoot Entertainment. Snoot’s Keith Calder and Jess Wu Calder serve as executive producers.
It Ends follows a group of recent grads whose post-college plans are derailed after they turn onto a never-ending backroad.
Ullom, who also wrote the film, was named one of Filmmaker Magazine’s 25 New Faces of Independent Film in 2024. It Ends went on to receive the Best First Feature Award at the Fantasia Film Festival and is featured as one of the launch titles on the Letterboxd Video Store in the Unreleased Gems shelf. Ullom’s next feature horror film, 4×4: The Event, was recently announced to be produced by Spooky Pictures and Image Nation after a competitive bidding process.
Ullom, Carusone, and Barber’s DIY approach exemplifies a new model of independent filmmaking – as seen by It Ends with an early investor coming on board after a VR poker game with Ullom, the cast being sourced from Instagram, and the on set production being made up entirely of Gen Z crew.
The deal was negotiated by NEON’s Sarah Colvin and Jessica Lacy of Range Media Partners on behalf of the filmmakers.
Heading into awards season, NEON recently received 21 Golden Globe nominations, the most of any motion picture studio this year, highlighting a significant moment for the company’s internationally driven slate. The nominations spanned 12 different categories, with 6 different films represented led by Joachim Trier’s Sentimental Value; Jafar Panahi’s Palme d’Or winner, It Was Just An Accident; Kleber Mendonça Filho’s The Secret Agent; Oliver Laxe’s Sirât; Park Chan-wook’s No Other Choice; and Ugo Bienvenu’s Arco. Five of these films have also been selected by their home countries as official selections for the Best International Feature Film category at the 98th Academy Awards.
Building on this momentum, NEON’s 2026 slate of upcoming releases include Matt Johnson’s Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie; Steven Soderbergh’s The Christophers; Baz Luhrmann’s EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert; and Boots Riley’s I Love Boosters, which is set to open SXSW this year; and more.”
