As the “Thanksgiving” trailer from “Grindhouse” took on a life of its own and fans wanted to see a fully realized version of Eli Roth’s and Jeff Rendell’s fresh idea, the filmmaking friends needed to find a definitive hook for the film’s premise. Eventually, they discovered that the traditional madness surrounding stores’ annual Black Friday sales perfectly fit the bill.
“Over the years, the fans kept nagging me, but we had no story. Once we saw the Black Friday trampling videos that were going viral, [we thought about it],” the “Hostel” franchise filmmaker recalled for Looper. “Every year, there were videos of these superstores and their midnight Black Friday sales of people who, a few hours earlier, were so thankful but now wanted to crush each other to death for a waffle iron. That was when we said, ‘There’s something really here. This is fertile ground.’ It gave the movie a theme and a reason to exist, and that’s when it started in earnest.”
