Was making Until Dawn a tougher job than the Shazam! movies? Here's what helmer David F. Sandberg said

FIlmmaker David F. Sandberg has revealed that the process of making his new horror thriller, Until Dawn, was tougher than his earlier Shazam! movies.

In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Sandberg recently revealed:

"...Until Dawn was a more complicated movie than any of the Shazam! movies."

Sandberg's horror directorial was released on April 25, 2025. It is a movie adaptation of Supermassive Games' 2015 video game of the same name. The film is penned by Blair Butler and Gary Dauberman.

Let us find out what more David F. Sandberg said about the making of Until Dawn.

It was very hard to make this movie: David F. Sandberg on Until Dawn

In the interview with The Hollywood Reporter, director David F. Sandberg talked talked about the process of directing Until Dawn being more complicated than his Shazam! movies. The helmer explained:

"Yes, but Until Dawn was a more complicated movie than any of the Shazam! movies. It was very hard to make this movie, and it was a very ambitious movie for the time and the money we had. But I was so eager to do horror again, and this was a dream come true in that I got to do lots of full-on R-rated kills and gore and special effects and special makeup and monsters. I’ve been wanting to do all of these things since I was a little kid. So that was very welcomed, but it was a challenge, for sure."

David F. Sandberg also spoke about his enthusiasm to go back to his peak interest, that is horror, with Until Dawn. He has had a long association with the genre, as he began his filmmaking journey making horror shorts.

His first horror attempt was the 2013 Swedish short movie, Lights Out, and since then, he has made Annabelle: Creation in 2017. He then explored the superhero genre with DC, directing Shazam! (2019) and Shazam! Fury of the Gods (2023).

His latest directorial effort has brought him back to horror films. Sandberg explained:

I wanted to do a horror movie after Shazam!, but there wasn’t time because we had to do Shazam! Fury of the Gods before the kids got too old. So then after Shazam 2, it had been a few years, and I really wanted to do horror again. Gary then got in touch to say that he wrote this script with Blair Butler that’s based on the game Until Dawn, and he sent it over. And I was like, “Well, this is awesome because it has every horror genre. I don’t even have to choose. I’ll get to do slasher, supernatural, body horror, monster and found footage.” It had everything in one movie, which is what really drew me to it."

Interestingly, his new film relies on practical effects than visual effects. David F. Sandberg mentions the challenges in infusing practical effects in films, adding that people prefer visual effects these days as it saves time. He feels the impact of practical is '"much scarier," as he explains:

“I wanted to do [practical effects] because I’ve always wanted to do them, but I understand why they’re not done as often anymore. Schedules are getting shorter and shorter on movies, and these things take time. You only get one shot, maybe two.”

He added:

“Once you have blood flying everywhere, sometimes you can’t even clean it up. So it’s much easier when it’s just something that’s added after … But it is much scarier to do it this way.”

Until Dawn follows the plot of a group of friends who are caught in the middle of a time loop as well as their lives being targetted by a horror entity. It all starts when Clover, one of the friends in the group, finds her sister to be missing.

The film stars Ella Rubin, Odessa A'zion, Michael Cimino, Ji-young Yoo, Maia Mitchell, and Belmont Cameli.