In 2019’s “Ready or Not,” a blood- and guts-splattered bride snorts with laughter as the bodies of her stepparents begin to explode around her. This moment is so unexpected, so absurd, so gory that it alone made the directorial team of Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillette, known as Radio Silence, a sensation among horror fans.
“The laughs in our movies are usually, ‘Should I laugh?’ moments,” Bettinelli-Olpin says.
“I’m like, ‘I can’t believe they just did that,'” Gillette added.
The duo hopes to surpass themselves tonight at this year’s SXSW, debuting “Ready or Not 2: Here I Come,” another exercise in outrageous carnage and boundary-pushing laughter.
In the film, a bride (Samara Weaving) and her sister (Kathryn Newton) try to outwit the richest family on the planet in a dangerous game in which the siblings become prey.
Shot for just $6 million, “Ready or Not” was a hit, but rather than use its success to increase the cost of making a sequel, the directors chose to cut back. To keep costs down, the duo gave Ready or Not 2 30 days to complete, which was only four more days than the original film. “It was a very well-planned shoot,” says Gillette. “But no matter how much you organize, plan, and design, things just don’t work out.”
The pair can’t believe they still made it out alive, recalling the film’s most gruesome moments, filled with lavish sets and bloody, intricate action scenes. Sets were scrapped at the end of the day, meaning there was no second chance to catch any missed shots, and the company had to move from location to location more than a dozen times over several days.
Elijah Wood, who played the villain in “Ready or Not 2,” says the duo’s enthusiasm was contagious and helped him overcome the stress he felt. “The atmosphere on a movie set comes from above,” Wood says. “Matt and Tyler create a really warm and fun environment for the crew and cast. They’re incredibly approachable. They’re fans of the genre, they’re fans of filmmaking. They really love the process, and that rubs off on everyone else.”
Director Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and director Tyler Gillette on the set of “Ready or Not 2: Here I Come.”
©Searchlight Pictures/Courtesy of Everett Collection
Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillette, who grew up in Oakland and Arizona, respectively, met while working in the mailroom at New Line Cinema in late 2000, hit it off, and talked nonstop about their favorite movies, including “Alien” and “Midnight Run.” Their sensibilities were tied more to their love of comedy than horror. “We find the same things funny, and we knew we had something in common: creating humor from subverting expectations,” says Gillette. “That hasn’t changed.”
Rather than being drawn to laugh-out-loud movies, Bettinelli-Olpin wanted to do something different. They envisioned “a pretty funny police movie or a sci-fi movie with a lot of jokes.”
So they started writing a short film, and a few hours later they began filming at the New Line offices. They did everything themselves, from writing to editing to camera work, and learned how to collaborate effectively. “It wasn’t like, ‘I’m the director, you’re the editor, you’re this,'” Bettinelli-Olpin says. “We were all working together. And the two of us worked really, really well together. I remember there was a moment during filming, during editing, throughout the process where we said to each other, ‘We should do this together.'” It was that simple. ”
They named themselves “Radio Silence”. This is an inside joke about not getting a callback on an early pitch to the studio. Despite some rejections, their shorts were eventually accepted and led to bigger gigs. They provided a popular segment on the 2012 found footage film “V/H/S” and produced and directed two segments on the acclaimed 2015 anthology film “Southbound.” Along the way, Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillette directed the 2014 ghost pregnancy feature “Devil’s Due.” All of these projects paved the way for her breakout with “Ready or Not.”
Gillette describes the many hats they wore on the first set as like “creating their own film school” with their collaborators, which helped set the parameters for how they would work early on.
“We know people and what they want from the process,” he says. “We have a really humble sense of what it takes to fit the rubber to the road when making a movie. Between Matt and I and the team of writers and producers we’ve worked with many times, we don’t just love building things, we love collaborating.”
Weaving enjoyed this spirit on set. “When I have suggestions and ideas, I feel heard,” she says. “As a young woman coming up in Hollywood, it can sometimes be hard to be taken seriously. As an actor, people might think something about you. And Matt and Tyler were very open-minded and receptive to my ideas and let me try things out. They really respect actors, but that’s not always the case.”
The success of “Ready or Not” allowed the duo to step into the ring and revive the “Scream” series in 2020. Chapter 5, co-written by Ready screenwriters Guy Busick and James Vanderbilt, is a new twist on the series, mixing toxic fandom and Reddit culture by finally creating a serial killer online.
“The way we approach everything we’ve ever made is that we love making fun little tie-ins and Easter eggs for ourselves and our friends,” says Bettinelli-Olpin. “But that’s how we approach everything: ‘Okay, we’re making this story. We’re not going to open the door to 12 other stories and do a bunch of other stuff.’ So when we were doing Scream 5, it was as fans. We were able to really tap into the core thematic premise of what they had written.”
The fifth film, Scream, was released in 2022, and Radio Silence has been busy ever since, releasing a sequel in 2023 and directing the original vampire comedy Abigail in 2024.
Many of their features are lo-fi or made on a modest budget. But Radio Silence’s next project will be even bigger. Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillette have been tapped to direct a reboot of the hit Mummy series starring Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz. Previous films in the series have been special effects-laden showpieces. Despite the vast canvas, the directors feel this is the job they’ve been aiming for their entire careers.
“Adventure films set in the desert are the holy grail for us,” says Bettinelli-Olpin. “We grew up watching ‘Indiana Jones.’ We were a little older when ‘The Mummy’ came out, and we fell in love with this movie. There’s something so thrilling about looking at it from that vantage point. ”
Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillette haven’t given many hints about how they plan to revive “Hamunaptra,” but viewers can probably expect some of the jump scares and laughs that Radio Silence is known for — even if the duo has to leave exploding corpses out of their family fare.
“We love absurd ideas that are so well done that there’s no point in them being this good,” says Gillette. “It sneaks up on you: ‘Oh my god, how crazy was that kill?’ ‘Oh, that fight was amazing.’ ‘Oh, wow, I can’t believe you’re crying!’ You’re actually feeling something! ”
Watch the trailer for “Ready or Not 2: Here I Come” below.
Correction: A previous print version of this article incorrectly listed the number of filming days for “Ready or Not 2.”
