Writer-director Charlie Polinger’s feature debut The Plague is set to open in limited U.S. release on Dec. 24, with an expansion date of Jan. 2, 2026, according to release listings for the film. The psychological drama centers on a socially anxious 12-year-old at an all-boys water polo camp who gets pulled into a “cruel tradition” aimed at an outcast the kids claim carries an illness they call “The Plague.”
Polinger has described the project as a response to how boyhood often gets framed on screen. “Being 12 felt more like a living hell of social anxiety,” he said in a Cannes Q&A, adding that he wanted to explore “the violence and vulnerability of boyhood.” He said the film’s emotional engine drew from journals he kept during a summer camp in 2003, with details of humiliation and shifting power taken from lived experience even as the story itself remains fictional.
Joel Edgerton stars and produces, joining a cast led by young actors Everett Blunck, Kayo Martin and Kenny Rasmussen. Edgerton said he signed on after reading the script through a mutual connection and wanted to help get the movie made: “I really wanted to see the movie get made,” he said in a recent interview. He framed his role as the camp’s adult presence as intentionally limited, calling it “a…adult force” that underlines how children “will govern themselves.”
Polinger has also spoken about balancing careful camera planning with room for the boys to surprise the crew, letting scenes run past scripted beats so performances stayed “raw and true to the age.” Film Independent, which hosted a fall screening and onstage conversation with Polinger and cinematographer Steven Breckon, said the film runs 95 minutes.
