Back in 2019, it was announced that Riverdale‘s Madelaine Petsch had signed on to star in a horror comedy called Clare at 16, which was going to be written and directed by Mark Pavia, the filmmaker behind the 1997 Stephen King adaptation The Night Flier, and based on a novel by Don Roff. That iteration of the project didn’t make it into production, and in 2022 Bella Thorne (Infamous) not only signed on to star in the title role of what was now being called Saint Clare, but she also brought Dying to Play (a.k.a. Braid) director Mitzi Peirone on board to write and direct the film. Saint Clare just had its premiere at the Taormina Film Festival, and during the event Thorne revealed to Deadline that she helped edit the serial killer movie.

The Don Roff novel told the following story: The small town of Pickman Flats offers a bright sunny place filled with quaint shopping and wine tasting. But underneath the town’s inviting exterior lies a dark underbelly, a sinister element that lurks in the shadows. Clare is a devoted vegan who goes to Catholic high school, is fastidious in her manner, and also, well, a serial killer. The Other Clare takes over at the most inopportune of times. She tries to keep her inner beast’s lust for blood at bay, but it’s hard when there are so many creeps around who help to unleash it. What secret lies hidden beneath Pickman Flats? And who is Clare really?

Scripted by Peirone and American Psycho co-writer Guinevere Turner, Saint Clare follows Clare Bleecker (Thorne), a quiet catholic college student with a divine vocation for killing.

Thorne is joined in the cast by Ryan Phillippe (I Know What You Did Last Summer), Rebecca De Mornay (Mother’s Day), Frank Whaley (Pulp Fiction), Bart Johnson (High School Musical), and Dylan Flashner (The Card Counter).

When Deadline mentioned there were genre and stylistic parallels between the short film Unsettled, which Thorne directed (and will be expanding into a feature called Color Your Hurt), and Saint Clare, Thorne said that may be because she “reedited Saint Clare. I didn’t like the way the first movie was edited – I think everybody was pretty unhappy with it. And then I was like, ‘I know these takes, I know there’s better stuff, I know it’s on the editing room floor. Let me take a stab at it and I’ll bring you a better project.’ … Editing is such a fickle thing. If you get an amazing editor and you have quite a few sessions of really understanding the movie and talking about the movie with them, you do come out with a much better project.” Thorne is currently negotiating to receive an editing credit alongside credited editor Patrick Sanchez Smith.

Speaking with Variety, Peirone mentioned that her approach to Saint Clare involved taking inspiration from the story of Joan of Arc. “Clare’s role model is Joan of Arc because she literally gave everything, herself included, to her mission. She says: ‘The fire that burns inside of me is stronger than the fire around me,’ which is a great message.“

Saint Clare had secured U.S. distribution through Screen Media, but since that company’s owner recently filed for bankruptcy, the film is now searching for another distributor.

Are you looking forward to seeing Bella Thorne as Saint Clare? Let us know by leaving a comment below.

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