The New "Pod" Trailer Warned You Not to Go Into the Basement

Is there really a monster in the basement or does it exist solely in their brother’s mind? It's not quite "To be or not to be?" but it is the question facing a pair of siblings early in the new trailer for Mickey Keating’s Pod.

In Pod, Ed (Dean Cates) receives an ominous call from his brother Martin (Brian Morvan) warning him to keep away from the family’s isolated vacation house. Given Martin’s history of paranoid schizophrenic behavior, Ed enlists their sister Lyla (Lauren Ashley Carter) to travel to the house and stage an intervention. Once they arrive, they find the house lined with what looks like tin foil and Martin wielding a gun, claiming to have locked a monster in the basement of the house.  

The trailer seems to be building up the central question of monster or madness for most of its run time. Perhaps instead of monsters locked in basements, the siblings should actually fear what their brother's condition could cause him to do. However, as it winds down, the trailer puts that debate right to bed with multiple quick shots which would appear to provide a definitive answer.  

Pod was an official selection of this year's SXSW Film Festival and it will be invading theaters and VOD on Aug. 28.