Nothing says “welcome to the neighborhood” like a body on your front lawn.
In Sharp Corner, Ben Foster isn’t just haunted by the dead—he’s consumed by them. The trailer for Jason Buxton‘s latest thriller, adapted from Russell Wangersky‘s short story, introduces a man whose suburban dream home becomes a psychological sinkhole. What begins as a noble crusade to save lives on a dangerously curved road morphs into something darker. More obsessive. And—judging by Foster’s eyes in that trailer—possibly irreversible.
Released by Vertical and premiering May 9 in select theaters and VOD, the film first made waves at TIFF 2024 and continued its festival sweep through Rome, Glasgow, and San Francisco. But the trailer? That’s where the real descent begins.
We watch Josh (Foster) go from concerned citizen to CPR zealot to unhinged street sentinel—think First Reformed‘s moral spiral meets the blunt-force suburban dread of The Invitation. As his fixation deepens, so does the cost: his marriage (with Cobie Smulders‘ grounded performance hinting at slow-burn devastation), his child’s safety, and whatever’s left of his sanity.
Obsession isn’t new to the thriller genre. But Sharp Corner reframes it through a lens of suburban design and privilege. The road is literally killing people—but it’s Josh’s belief in his own ability to “fix” it that’s truly dangerous. The trailer teases a man slipping into the kind of deluded savior complex that feels eerily close to real life—where men weaponize “purpose” in the name of protection, only to cause more destruction.
The comparison to David Cronenberg‘s Crash (1996) isn’t lazy—it’s telling. But where Crash fused eroticism with metal-on-flesh collisions, Sharp Corner strips it down to cold trauma. No allure. Just aftermath.
And Foster? He’s in Hell or High Water mode again—but this time, there’s no bank to rob, only his own sense of control. Buxton, best known for Blackbird, directs with what early festival buzz called “a cruel tenderness,” a style that doesn’t scream horror but whispers it through dread, timing, and the sound of distant sirens.
Would you trade your family’s safety for a chance to play hero? Sharp Corner asks—then dares you to answer.
