The sisterhood of the Satanic cults reached its conclusion at SXSW with the world premiere of They Will Kill You on Tuesday night, closing out the festival with an “eat the rich” mentality.
Co-written and directed by Kirill Sokolov, with co-writer Alex Litvak, the bloody action-packed thrill ride follows a fun theme of sisters taking on cults, which popped up over the past week in Ready or Not 2: Here I Come, Forbidden Fruits and Seekers of Infinite Love.
In They Will Kill You, Asia Reaves (Zazie Beetz) takes a maid job at The Virgil, a 100-year old apartment building in New York City, where the elite have long called their home. But her true motives for taking the gig are soon revealed as the shit quickly hits the fan.
After abandoning her younger sister Maria (Myha’la) and leaving her with their abusive father a decade before, Asia tracks down her long-lost sibling at the building, which has a dark history of the help going missing.
It soon becomes clear that the building’s tenants have nefarious plans for her, hunting her down to make an offering to Satan in exchange for immortality. But luckily, Asia came prepared with a bag full of weapons and the determination to save her sister.
The movie features an iconic ensemble cast, from Patricia Arquette‘s Irish building superintendent Lily to wealthy tenants Kevin (Tom Felton) and Sharon (Heather Graham), each bringing a distinct unhinged performance to the onscreen cult in this high-octane, adrenaline-pumping flick.
With nods to films of the samurai and shoot-em-up genres, Beetz gives the physical performance of a lifetime, wielding swords and firing guns at a building full of evil yuppies. And Sokolov spares no blood rig throughout the film, with red spraying out of every wound, and some creative viscera that tests the limits of its characters’ invincibility.
Meanwhile, Beetz and Myha’la pack an emotional punch as well with their tragic story of estranged sisterhood, pushing the pair to reconnect and make things right. Although Satan prefers blood, it turns out the most impactful sacrifices come from love.
Sokolov leaves it all on the floor with his genre-driven take on satanic cults, which is told with humor and heart (literally), thanks to its stellar cast, led by a pair of newly minted ‘Scream Queens’ who will have audiences rooting for them to eliminate the one percent.
Title: They Will Kill You
Festival: SXSW (Headliner)
Distributor: New Line Cinema/Nocturna/Warner Bros. Pictures
Release date: March 27, 2026
Director: Kirill Sokolov
Screenwriters: Kirill Sokolov, Alex Litvak
Cast: Zazie Beetz, Myha’La, Paterson Joseph, Tom Felton, Heather Graham, Patricia Arquette
Running time: 1 hr 34 mins
