Director Colin Minihan Talks about ‘Coyotes’

After weathering the grind of Hollywood development hell, Grave Encounters and What Keeps You Alive director Colin Minihan returns to form with Coyotes – a gutsy, genre-smashing horror comedy making its UK premiere at FrightFest Halloween 2025. It’s his fourth feature with actor-composer Brittany Allen, and arguably his most unfiltered yet: equal parts chaos and catharsis, clawing at absurdity one minute and barrelling into emotion the next. And yes, there are puppets.

“I want the audience to feel everything. Laugh, wince, get misty-eyed, scream… maybe all in the same 20 minutes,” says Minihan, whose resume blends high-concept indie horror with tonal whiplash. “It’s easy to stick to one drab tone for 90 minutes and call it art. What’s harder — and bolder — is to swing big.”

That kind of swing defines Coyotes, which follows a Hollywood Hills family under siege from a pack of smart, territorial, and terrifyingly well-organised wild coyotes. When the power goes out and wildfires close in, the Stewarts are left to defend their hillside home with little more than bad luck and worse choices.

The concept was inspired by real LA wildlife and a script that, according to Minihan, had him laughing out loud on first read: “I’ve always wondered why no one had made a horror film with Coyotes in L.A. They’re everywhere. People won’t even walk their dogs at night. They’re a real threat.”

Still, this isn’t an eco-horror morality tale. “I love coyotes,” Minihan insists. “Depicting them as wild, violent killers lived in my imagination — but this isn’t Jaws. I’m not trying to convince you to stay out of the ocean. This is a horror comedy that is blatantly cheeky.”

The film leans hard into style, with chaotic split screens and gonzo energy echoing Raimi and Rodriguez. Shot over just 21 days in Bogotá, Colombia, Coyotes cleverly fakes its LA setting with clever VFX and a lot of grit. “There wasn’t an option to use real coyotes in Bogotá — too expensive to ship and also coyotes are too sensitive for what I needed them to actually do,” Minihan explains. “We built three custom puppets — super detailed. No digital cleanup on those shots either. It’s all in how you shoot them.”

Minihan has a habit of building emotional undercurrents into his chaos. In Coyotes, that comes via the strained dynamic between Justin Long and Kate Bosworth’s characters, married parents trying to keep it together amid impending doom. “Justin was the first actor that came to mind after reading the script. I was lucky Kate read it for him — she has killer cinematic instincts.”

He rounds out the cast with longtime creative partner Brittany Allen, whose character Jules echoes Minihan’s previous antiheroine from It Stains the Sands Red. “Jules is nuts on the surface — but like Molly, once you peel back those layers, there’s real pain underneath. She’s not just comic relief; she gives the third act emotional texture that sneaks up on you.”

This tightrope walk between sincerity and satire defines the film’s tricky edit, which Minihan handled himself: “The real challenge was keeping the flow and pace moving because it’s a strange script in the sense that the protagonist doesn’t truly know they’re in a horror film so to speak until about page 45.”

The final film is a mix of practical effects, tonal shiftiness, and a clear, slightly cynical love for genre. It ends on a note that’s unexpectedly weighty, shaped in part by Minihan’s real-life experience with wildfires: “I took my old Soviet-era K3 Super 16 camera and shot the aftermath of the Eaton Canyon fire in Altadena — just five minutes from my house. I worked that footage tastefully into the credit sequence.”

What began as a tongue-in-cheek survival flick now lands somewhere between family drama, creature feature, and meta satire. Minihan’s proudest creative risk? “Honestly? The entire tone.”

After years spent trying to please studios, he’s no longer interested in playing it safe. “I’ve written some really edgy scripts I’d love to make, but they scare the money people. So maybe I’ll just make a weird liminal horror movie for fun and sell it to one of these ‘high art’ distributors who love pretending they discover high art.”

One thing’s for sure: Coyotes is a howling good time with real teeth.

Coyotes screens at FrightFest Halloween 2025 on Saturday 1 November at the ODEON Luxe West End. Tickets available via frightfest.co.uk.

Coyotes trailer