GAINESVILLE, FL (352today.com) – It’s been a really good year for independent horror films breaking through to the mainstream, and the next heavily hyped one in the queue, the psychological horror flick “It Ends,” opens in wide release this Friday.
“It Ends” won acclaim at the South by Southwest Film Festival, earned rave reviews from the likes of Variety, Rolling Stone and the Guardian, and holds a “Fresh” 92 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
And a Gainesville High School grad helped make it happen.
Carrie Carusone, of GHS’s Class of ’16, co-produced “It Ends” through the company she co-founded, Growing Up Dead Films, and served as production designer as well.
(Warning: This trailer contains adult language.)
Carusone, now based in Brooklyn, took three years of digital video classes with Gainesville High School teacher Tony Malo before attending Florida State University’s College of Motion Picture Arts.
“Ten years after her graduation from GHS, Carusone and Malo are still in touch,” read an announcement from Alachua County Public Schools celebrating her success. “She’s served as a judge for the film festivals Malo has organized for his students’ work, and she’s advised students interested in attending FSU’s film program. She also invited him out to O’Leno State Park in High Springs during filming of ‘It Ends,’ and even gave him a few lines in the movie–although they didn’t make it into the final cut.”