Romulus Director Fede Alvarez Into Hollywood

The elevator description for Fede Alvarez’s 2009 sci-fi short, Panic Attack!, is as follows: “Giant robots invade Montevideo!” Frankly, the future director of Evil Dead, Don’t Breathe, and Alien: Romulus would have had us at “giant robots,” but it’s even cooler now that the short has been jazzed up and re-shared to YouTube.

The short runs just under five minutes, but that was long enough to bring the Uruguayan filmmaker to Hollywood’s attention—and the rest is history. (You can still watch the original version here.) Not bad going from making your own calling-card sci-fi tale (Alvarez directed, edited, and did the VFX; he also had a hand in the robot design)—to 11 years later, making a new Evil Dead movie, and then 15 years later, helming a new entry in the Alien franchise.

Sharing the new version of Don’t Panic! on X, Alvarez wrote, “14 years ago I made a short movie with $300 and a lot of help from friends and colleagues. It forever changed my life and opened the Hollywood doors. Here is is, remastered and upscaled. Check it out!”

Alien: Romulus bursts out of chests and onto the screen August 16; watch Don’t Panic! below.

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