The 1990 movie Flatliners opens with the line “Today is a good day to die.” Starring Kiefer Sutherland, Kevin Bacon, and Julia Roberts, the sci-fi flick toyed with the idea of the afterlife, following a few medical students who experiment with flatlining (read: dying) to find out what happens beyond death. But when they come back to, they are haunted by past sins in increasingly dangerous ways. The Joel Schumacher film is the kind of perfect 90s B-movie you’re likely never to have heard of – making it a perfect candidate to be remade with a fresh new young cast. So when Ellen Page and Diego Luna were first cast in a 2017 version of Flatliners, everyone assumed we’d be getting a reboot.
As it turns out, this we’re getting a sequel. As Courtney Holmes, Page plays the character leading the experiment this time around, and she is the first one to flatline. Joining Page are The Vampire Diaries‘ Nina Dobrev, English actor James Norton, and Dope‘s Kiersey Clemons, all of whom play fellow students who decide to flatline. But what at first looks like a thrilling ride (“It’s like her brain’s been rewired,” they notice, once Courtney is able to play the piano after flatlining) soon turns scarier and scarier. Could you have guessed that Luna, sporting a hairstyle we’re not quite ready to endorse just yet, is the only one who sees how dangerous meddling with death can get? From the looks of it, though, they don’t heed his warning.
In between creepy images of drowned young women, steamy shower scenes, and terrifying pool-side moments, the latest trailer for Flatliners is definitely living up to its 90s original. And that’s without revealing it’s no reboot after all but a sequel. Yep, Sutherland (reprising his role as Dr. Nelson Wright) is sure to show up at some point, no doubt to echo what Luna was telling them all along: “This experiment has to end right now.”
Check out Diego’s long hair and the rest of the Flatliners cast in the full trailer below.
Flatliners opens September 29, 2017