‘The Rental’ Trailer: Dave Franco’s Directorial Debut Is a Horror Movie with an Indie Dream Team

Actor Dave Franco jumps into the director’s chair with his first feature, “The Rental,” a horror movie opening theatrically, in select drive-ins, and on demand on July 24. With an indie dream team cast including Alison Brie, Dan Stevens, Jeremy Allen White, and Sheila Vand, the film is written by Franco with Joe Swanberg, with Mike Demski contributing to the tense story. Watch the film’s first trailer below.

In “The Rental,” two couples retreat to an oceanside getaway hoping to escape their problems but are met with many more when the host of their seemingly perfect rental house may or may not be spying on them. What should’ve been a weekend of celebration takes sinister turns as buried secrets among the four old friends come to the surface and relationships are cast into crisis.

Ahead of its July release date, “The Rental” is getting a special treatment courtesy of the film’s distributor, IFC Films, and ArcLight Cinemas with a pop-up experience at the Vineland Drive-in movie theater on June 18. The screening will feature a live Q&A with director Franco, along with the film’s cast. Social distancing measures will be in place at all times, of course. As exhibitors and distributors look for creative ways to lure audiences out of quarantine and back to the movies, even as theaters around the country slowly begin to open, this kind of experience looks to be the normal for the summer movie season, or what remains of it.

While this is Dave Franco’s first go at feature filmmaking, he previously directed the short film “Dream Girl w/ Dave Franco & Alison Brie,” starring his wife, Alison Brie, and co-directed by Brian McGinn. Brie stars in Netflix’s “GLOW” and was last seen on the platform in the Sundance psychological thriller “Horse Girl.” “The Rental” co-star Sheila Vand is a horror icon herself, having starred in the cult vampire movie “A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night.” Dave Franco was last seen in front of the camera in Netflix’s “6 Underground,” as well as in Joe Swanberg’s Netflix TV series “Easy.”

Check out the trailer for “The Rental” below, and look for the movie on July 24.