‘Pacific Rim’ Screenwriter Travis Beacham’s Directorial Debut Looks Beautifully Odd

Pacific Rim screenwriter Travis Beacham has been up to something lately. After his ill-fated ancient Egypt drama show Hieroglyph was scrapped at FOX after only a few episodes were shot, this past July he completed production on his first full-length feature film called The Curiosity. The film was inspired by and takes some cues from Hieroglyph, and tells the same kind of fantastical story on a smaller scale.

Yesterday, Beacham shared the first teaser trailer for The Curiosity, which is described simply as “a strange new fairy tale.” There’s not that much to it, but it does feature a pretty cool shot that kinda looks like a person is being birthed out of the skin of an animal. There’s more information on the film’s Tumblr, which hints that the movie is actually about selkies — mythical creatures that are seals in the water but turn into humans when they set foot on land. Scottish mermaids, essentially.

Here’s some more background on the film from Beacham:

Without giving too much away, it’s a small-scale fantasy, somewhere in the budgetary neighborhood of indie genre fare like Pan’s Labyrinth or District 9. That is to say only that it’s an intimately focused, character-driven tale, nevertheless set in a world of its own.

The Curiosity tells the story of Spindle (Caroline Ford), a pointy-eared girl who has traveled across a magical ocean and ended up a long way from home, who meets a magician named Datchery Bell (Doug Roland). As of now, there’s no release date for the film yet, although it could end up in theaters very soon if it’s picked up by a major distribution company.