Tai Freligh chats with Corporate Retreat director Aaron Fisher…
The modern workplace has inspired its share of nightmares, but director Aaron Fisher takes that anxiety to deliriously bloody extremes with Corporate Retreat, a horror–dark comedy that transforms a luxury team-building getaway into a savage fight for survival.
Premiering at the Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival before opening in U.S. theaters on May 22, the film blends vicious corporate satire, pitch-black humor, and jaw-dropping practical effects from special makeup legend Gary J. Tunnicliffe. Following the personal storytelling of his earlier feature Inside the Rain, Fisher pivots into genre territory with a viral buzz already building around the film’s ensemble cast and gleefully gory premise. For Flickering Myth, Tai Freligh sat down with Fisher to discuss skewering corporate culture, orchestrating onscreen chaos, and why team bonding may never feel safe again.
Corporate Retreat turns a glossy team-building getaway into a blood-soaked survival story. What sparked the idea of corporate culture as a horror setting?
At first I was inspired by the movie Saw. I wanted to write a story where a group of people (who are used to being treated well) were stuck in a room and tortured to death. I wanted to make a horror film on a low budget (out of necessity) and I thought it was a good idea to set most of a story in one big room. The idea was to cut down on costs by having virtually zero company moves with the crew. Next, I thought about what reasons a group of people might get stuck in a room together. Most of my ideas were unoriginal and bad, but then I thought about the story of my father’s own financial collapse when I was in college. His former company went under and he also went personally bankrupt. I remember my dad had a lot of raw feelings about being pushed out of his own company. I then thought, what if my dad was a psycho killer and wanted to get revenge on his old colleagues? And the idea of a corporate retreat was born! The fictional psychopath version of my father could trap his old employees on a fake corporate retreat.
The film blends savage satire with graphic horror. How did you balance dark humor and real tension so the laughs never deflate the fear?
This is a good question because it was very tricky to tell myself how I wanted to direct the actors and the camera. The film is just as much a dark comedy as it is a horror film. What makes it a horror film are all of the insane amounts of gore and being stuck in a death trap. The humor is always there too so I had to direct for laughs as well as for frightening amounts of violence. On day one I told the actors, although this is also a dark comedy, we will play all the scenes as if it were a prestige drama. In other words, I didn’t want the SNL version of comedy acting. I wanted the kind of acting that was very serious and good. I told the actors to focus on the emotional event of each scene. We focused on what was going on in each scene and then played the situation full tilt. Ironically, sometimes solving the truth of a scene meant going over the top with SNL style acting, because the situations were just so ridiculous. I’m a fan of when actors take risks in their performances and sometimes that means doing everything completely and utterly “wrong” and bonkers.
Workplace hierarchies can already feel predatory. Did real-world corporate dynamics influence the characters’ power struggles?
I imagined a scenario where my father, the former CEO and founder of his company that went under, goes psycho and looks for revenge. It was kind of like a joke in my mind as I was writing the script, directing the movie on set, and in the editing room. My father in real life is the nicest human being! Our family is very close. My brother was the cinematographer, and he’s really excellent!
Some early reactions liken the film to The Menu colliding with Saw. Were you consciously playing with genre expectations or trying to subvert them?
I did my best to follow genre expectations. Not once did I ever think, “let’s subvert genre expectations.” Funny enough, I probably ended up subverting them quite a bit just because I have a strange and unique imagination.
Horror often mirrors cultural anxiety. What modern fears or pressures did you want audiences to recognize beneath the carnage?
I think horror films are having a moment because of so much cultural anxiety these days. I think people are afraid of everything because of recent advances in technology, including AI. The main villain in Corporate Retreat (played excellently by Alan Ruck) is a mix of different tech people in the news. I borrowed from a number of people, not just one.
You collaborated with special effects legend Gary J. Tunnicliffe. How did practical effects shape the film’s most visceral moments?
Gary is a true artist. He really took the time and energy to put loving care into the practical effects. The vast majority of all the blood and gore was done by using practical effects and makeup. I don’t want to give away anything but the most violent moments in the movie are done 100% practical with no VFX. And it’s seriously disturbing to watch! Gary made everything look so real it was incredible. He’s a nice down to earth guy but he’s also kind of like a mad scientist at work.
With a large ensemble that includes Alan Ruck and Rosanna Arquette, what did that generational mix bring to the film’s shifting power dynamics?
Well, Alan Ruck is clearly older than his former colleagues in the movie, which helped explain part of why he feels so left out and betrayed. Rosanna Arquette adds to the generational mix of the executives, who are all very young aside from Alan and Rosanna.
Your earlier film Inside the Rain explored intimate emotional struggles. What drew you toward the explosive, satirical horror space with this project?
Inside the Rain was a loosely autobiographical film about the growing pains of being bipolar. Having struggled so much with my mental health I often felt like an outsider or a freak of nature looking in to the “normal” crowd. Although Corporate Retreat is a completely different kind of movie, I still wanted the story to be about being an outsider or a freak in a freak show. Alan Ruck’s character even refers to himself as a freak. In the same way, he forces his former colleagues to act out this freak show where they have to torture themselves in a room that resembles an ant farm, with floor to ceiling windows all around.
The film premieres at the Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival, a haven for genre fans. What excites you about debuting it there?
Everything! I can’t wait to watch the movie with an audience for the first time. I hear the theater has 1,800 seats!! I feel so lucky!
If Corporate Retreat had a corporate mission statement, what would it be?
To accelerate the world’s transition to spiritual enlightenment.
Aaron Fisher graduated from the School of Visual Arts in New York City. He wrote, directed, and starred in the feature film Inside the Rain, co-starring Academy® Award nominees Rosie Perez and Eric Roberts. After a pandemic-shortened 2020 theatrical release, the film was acquired by Showtime, and is widely available on streaming platforms.
Inside the Rain premiered at the Woodstock Film Festival, where it was nominated for Best Narrative Feature, and went on to play the Nashville, Twin Cities (Centerpiece), San Diego (Best Comedy nomination), Big Apple (Best Feature winner), Cinema on the Bayou (Special Jury Award), and Los Angeles New Filmmakers film festivals. The film earned critical acclaim, with and 86% Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes. David Lewis of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote “In this assured, offbeat comedy, director-star Aaron Fisher shines both behind and in front of the camera.”
Featuring an acclaimed ensemble cast including Alan Ruck, Odeya Rush, Ashton Sanders, Rosanna Arquette, Sasha Lane, Kirby Johnson, Zion Moreno, Tyler Alvarez, Benjamin Norris, Elias Kacavas, and Ellen Toland, Corporate Retreat is a savage horror–dark comedy that sends a group of ambitious young executives on a luxury team-building escape—only to strip it down into a brutal, blood-soaked fight for survival. Equal parts vicious satire and survival nightmare, the film skewers corporate culture while unleashing graphic carnage, pitch-black humor, and jaw-dropping twists that ensure nobody’s performance review is safe.
Many thanks to Aaron Fisher for taking the time for this interview. He can be found on IMDb, X, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and his website.
“Corporate Retreat” slashes its way into U.S. theaters on May 22, 2026. The movie can be found on Instagram and YouTube.
PHOTOS: Passage Pictures
Tai Freligh writes about entertainment and pop culture for Flickering Myth from sunny Huntington Beach, California…just a hop and a skip from Los Angeles. He can be found on LinkedIn, Threads, TikTok and his website.
Originally published March 5, 2026. Updated March 4, 2026.
