Xavier Dolan, best known for directing I Killed My Mother, It’s Only the End of the World and Tom at the Farm, has revealed that he’s working on a period horror film, set in 1880s France.

The untitled project plans to begin shooting late next year. Xavier Dolan told the podcast Sans Filtre that “it’s something I wrote before the pandemic, and I’m looking at again… it’s a genre film, a horror film, set in 1880s in France.” If the project goes ahead, it will be Dolan’s first feature since Matthias & Maxime, which premiered in Competition at the Cannes Film Festival in 2019.

“It feels removed from my life and what I know but on re-reading it, I understood that it is a film about the fear of failure, the fear of being rejected, of being misunderstood, the difficulty of creating,” Dolan continues, teasing what to expect from his upcoming project.

He adds, “Unconsciously, I’ve returned to the same themes, in a period that I don’t know, but which appeals to me and in a style which appeals to me, but with a completely different proposition. I feel that I can surpass myself, learn and grow with themes that are dear to me but in the horror genre.”

“It’s going to cost a lot. You’ve got the costumes, the lighting,” he said of the production, which he plans to shoot on location in and around the iconic Mont-Saint-Michel in Normandy, as well as in the studio.