The filmmakers behind Freaky, Happy Death Day and Werewolves Within have ensured that no couple is safe this Valentine’s Day with new bloody slasher Heart Eyes.
Screenwriters Phillip Murphy (The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard) and Christopher Landon (Happy Death Day, Freaky) & Michael Kennedy (Freaky) seamlessly marry the slasher and rom-com genres together for one entertaining, gory romp centered around an emoji mask-inspired killer who stalks and hunts couples on the most romantic holiday of the year.
It may come as no surprise that Heart Eyes originated from a date gone wrong. Great chemistry in a Zoom chat didn’t translate in person, but it did leave Phillip Murphy with killer inspiration. “I was on my moped, driving home from that date just livid, furious,“ Murphy tells Bloody Disgusting. “I was like, ‘I know there’s something there.‘ I was thinking of a killer coming after us. That was pretty seamless. Then, the rom-com started to evolve when I started working with Chris, who was an early shepherd of it and was great.
“But for me, the slasher, that was really already in place, and then Chris and Michael just built it up even more. But my draft really did come together really quickly and organically because I was so pissed off at that date. I was so angry. It’s almost like this idea was in there just waiting to come out.”
Murphy landed on the slasher-meets-rom-com concept early on, and the next step, of course, was landing on the perfect villain. What’s a slasher without a memorable masked killer, after all? While the film’s killer and title draw from a popular emoji, Murphy reveals that he began with a drastically different idea in mind for the Heart Eyes Killer’s mask.
“It was supposed to be Chuck Woolery but rest in peace, he recently passed away,“ Murphy says. “But it was a Chuck Woolery mask, and I thought I could probably do better than that. Nobody really knows who he is, outside of ’80s kids.” That’s when inspiration struck again. “When I just was looking at the emoji and thinking about how that would look, I’m like, ‘That’s got to be it, that just has to be it.‘ Then it evolved with these two guys.”
The Heart Eyes killer from Screen Gems and Spyglass Media Group’s HEART EYES. photo by: Christopher Moss
Landon and Kennedy looked to the killer’s motives to further evolve Murphy’s concept for a heart eyes emoji-inspired killer. Landon explains, “Michael and I came on, and one of the things that we knew based on some of the changes that we were making to the script is that we wanted this to feel like it was a sexualized get-up that was very kink-specific and kind of S&M-y. That this was more than just a person stomping around, killing couples. It was someone who deeply loved what they do, how they do it, and the style with which they approach it. That was something that we were really into. Then Josh [Ruben] came into the process and then leveled it up even more.”
Landon adds, “It was Josh’s idea to have these eyes that light up and, actually, our night vision goggles as well. So there’s functionality to it, as well as the bespoke weapons with parts in them. That was a Josh thing, and that was what made us really fall in love with his angle.”
More than the killer’s design, Landon and Kennedy also ensured this slasher came loaded with inventive kills. “I always credit Chris; he’s come up with the elaborate ones on this,“ Kennedy says of Heart Eyes’ more elaborate deaths. “I’m the stabby-stab writer, and Chris is like, ‘No, no, no, we should cut him in half with a table saw.‘ Oh, okay.”
“I walk into a lot of rooms and just imagine how people would die or how I would kill them,“ Landon amusingly says of his talent for penning on-screen horror kills. “So, it’s always very much germane to the setting. I knew I wanted to open the movie at a winery. I knew that just felt like this is where you would propose. I actually live near Wine Country up in Santa Barbara, and so I thought, ‘Oh gosh, two really bougie, douchey people having this romantic moment in a winery.‘” We won’t spoil what, exactly, this opening kill entails, but let’s just say that it’s gloriously gory and original.
“My poor husband probably sleeps with one eye open because I really do love thinking of ways to kill people,“ Landon cracks.
Olivia Holt as Ally and Mason Gooding as Jay in Screen Gems and Spyglass Media Group’s HEART EYES. photo by: Christopher Moss
While the trio nailed the mechanics of a slasher/rom-com hybrid, all three screenwriters are unanimous in that characters are the most important part of any script. Especially in horror. “I think any great slasher movie starts with characters first,“ Kennedy says. That’s reflected in the complexity of Olivia Holt‘s final girl, Ally.
While Kennedy took care to ensure a complex heroine, he’s quick to credit Holt for what she brought to the role. “The thing about Olivia is everything about her just brought so much to the character that you can’t even put on screen or on paper. She just has this thing about her. The other thing that was really important too, was also making her smart. She does so many really smart things in the movie, and she fights back. The belt situation? The belt on the door, that is so smart.”
Having horror stalwarts like Landon and Kennedy on board also helped with keeping seasoned horror fans on their toes, especially when it comes to the whodunnit aspect of this slasher.
“A huge part of it was the subversion and also knowing that we get to build to a certain kind of climax, pun intended, that is different than what we’ve traditionally seen in these kinds of movies and specifically a Valentine’s slasher,“ Landon explains. “It’s character-driven, but it’s also very much driven by, I think, a group of people who are all very familiar with the genre. We know all the tropes, and so that’s the other joy in writing these kinds of things. It’s like, ‘Oh, here’s where you’re expecting us to go, and then here’s our hairpin turn the other way to keep it interesting.‘”
Kennedy adds, ‘The Valentine’s Day movies before us really helped us set the table and then flip it over, you know what I mean? Even going back to Scream, the boyfriend being the killer is already in people’s heads just because there’s a boyfriend in the movie. So, we really got to take advantage of what people think is going to happen in a lot of fun ways.”
Heart Eyes releases in theaters on February 7, 2025.
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