Director Daniel Lerch’s Saturnalia has arrived early on Amazon Video — the acclaimed giallo thriller, originally scheduled for a later digital release, is now available to rent or buy exclusively on the platform.
Set in 1979, the film follows Miriam Basconi (Sophia Anthony), a young woman sent to the prestigious Alstroemerias Academy following the mysterious deaths of both her parents. From her first day, something feels wrong. Students vanish in the night. Strange men lurk in the shadows. The headmistress, known only as Hemlock, rules with an iron hand whose cruelty is spoken of in hushed whispers throughout the school’s marble corridors. As Miriam pushes deeper into the academy’s secrets, she stumbles into something far stranger — a hidden world pulsing beneath the school itself, where nightmare and reality blur into something she may not survive.
The film draws unmistakably on the Italian giallo tradition — the heightened color palette, the institutional dread, the conspiracy of silence that surrounds a central female protagonist trying to trust her own perceptions. Lerch channels that lineage with clear affection while building something genuinely disquieting on its own terms.
Saturnalia is distributed by Terror Films, a genre-focused label with a strong track record of finding distinctive indie horror across the global market. Reviews are welcome to run immediately, and screeners are available upon request.
Rent or buy Saturnalia now on Amazon Video: amazon.com.
