HBO have a reputation for stellar true crime documentaries and this year will be following up 'The Jinx' with what looks like an equally enthralling but terrifying watch in the form of 'Beware the Slenderman'.
'Beware the Slenderman' will focus on the horrific real life events that lead to two 12-year-old girls to stabbing a classmate 19 times in a woods in Wisconsin in 2014, blaming the fictional Slenderman and saying they were doing it "to prove he’s real, and so he wouldn’t kill their families."
The Slenderman is a fictional supernatural monster/bogeyman born in an online forum in 2009 out of a meme and has since then gained infamy among younger generations after being responsible for modern day horror stories, video games and other media.
Irene Taylor Brodsky's documentary "uses the (fictional) disturbing figure to explore not only the effect that Internet lore has on real-life actions, but also how the digital age is saturating the imagination and actions of children" according to Indie Wire, and will premiere at SXSW on March 11 before getting a release on HBO.
The official synopsis and poster are below:
Shot over 18 months with heartbreaking access to the families of the would-be murderers, the film plunges deep down the rabbit hole of their crime, a Boogeyman and our society’s most impressionable consumers of media. The entrance to the internet can quickly lead us to its dark basement, within just a matter of clicks. How much do we hold children responsible for what they find there?
Via Indie Wire