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Horror movie studios protect one thing more than babies

Horror movie writer and director Christopher Landon has revealed that the studios behind the most depraved offerings draw the line at killing one thing.

Babies in horror movies

Christopher Landon is a writer and director behind most of the Paranormal Activity movies, Happy Death Day, and Freaky. His upcoming Netflix horror movie is called We Have a Ghost, starring David Harbour and Anthony Mackie. It’s more of a family-friendly horror movie than his usual fare, with a PG-13 rating, and will be released on February 24.

In a new interview with IndieWire, Landon explains how becoming a father has changed his horror writer-director instincts. “You have kids, and you start to see things differently, and you also start to not want to put certain things out into the world. There’s really just a certain kind of violence, like a realistic brutality, that I have a hard time dealing with now, specifically if it involves kids, that’s kind of a no-no thing.”

Landon laughed, recalling an early meeting involving one of his Paranormal Activity films. “Someone [at the studio] presented us with a chart, and it was like, these are the acceptable things that you can do and the things you can’t do.”

“They were designated in a specific order, and at the very top was, you can’t kill a dog, and then under that was a baby, and 10 down, was a cat. Our priorities as a society are very fucked up because dog is above baby.” He laughed. “But I also understand that. I’m a dog lover!” It looks as though the studios draw the line when it comes to man’s best friend.

There has been a whopping seven Paranormal Activity movies, with the most recent film in the poltergeist ghost movie series coming out in 2021. Landon wrote four movies in the series and directed one – Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones (2014). Landon recently gave us some encouraging news regarding another film in his slasher movie series – Happy Death Day 3 – so he hasn’t entirely moved into making movies for children.

If you’re looking forward to We Have a Ghost, check out our guide to some other scary movies for kids.