Junji Ito's 'The Long Hair In The Attic' Gets Feature Adaptation From Toei, Showbox, and Thai Director Sitisiri Mongkolsiri

One of horror manga's most beloved short works is heading to the big screen, and the international team assembling behind it is worth paying close attention to. 'The Long Hair In The Attic,' based on Junji Ito's 1988 one-shot manga, is currently in development through a three-way studio partnership spanning Japan, Thailand, and South Korea. With a production start targeting early 2027, this is early enough that crew conversations are almost certainly not yet happening at any significant scale, but the caliber of the collaboration and the attached director make this one of the more exciting genre projects to get on your radar now.

At the helm is Thai filmmaker Sitisiri Mongkolsiri, whose recent work has earned him serious international attention. His Netflix original film 'Hunger,' a sleek and visually assured Thai culinary thriller, became one of the platform's most-watched non-English language titles after its 2023 release, introducing his work to a genuinely global audience. Before that, his feature 'Inhuman Kiss' and its sequel showcased a facility with folkloric horror and supernatural visuals that made him a name to watch in Southeast Asian genre filmmaking. He brings that exact sensibility to the Ito adaptation, which centers on a young woman whose hair becomes supernaturally animated with a hunger for vengeance following a painful breakup. Ito's source material is compact but viscerally effective, and Mongkolsiri's eye for dread and body horror makes him a logical and exciting choice to expand it into a feature-length film.

The production structure behind this project is as notable as the creative attachment. Japan's Toei Company, one of the oldest and most storied studios in Japanese entertainment history, is involved on the IP development side. Toei's portfolio spans everything from the 'Kamen Rider' and 'Super Sentai' franchises to major theatrical anime releases, and the company has increasingly leaned into international co-productions as a way to extend its IP globally. Thailand's M Studio brings production infrastructure and a strong theatrical distribution footprint across Southeast Asia, a region where horror consistently outperforms at the local box office. South Korea's Showbox rounds out the partnership with its well-established international sales and distribution muscle. Showbox has been behind some of Korean cinema's most commercially successful exports, and their involvement here signals genuine ambitions for wide theatrical release well beyond the region. Together, the three companies represent a genuinely complementary set of capabilities: IP, production, and distribution, all aligned behind one project.

No specific filming location has been confirmed yet, which is not surprising given the project's early development status. Given the nationalities of the partners and the director's base of operations, a Thailand-based shoot seems the most logical assumption, though co-productions of this structure often involve location work across multiple countries. Thailand's film infrastructure has grown considerably in recent years, with Bangkok supporting a solid crew base for mid-to-large-scale genre productions. The country does not currently offer the aggressive tax incentive rebates that draw productions to Georgia or the UK, but its cost efficiencies and the director's familiarity with local crews and locations make it a practical center of gravity. If any portion of production involves Japanese settings or aesthetic, additional shooting in Japan remains a real possibility. Crew in Southeast Asia, South Korea, and Japan should all keep a close eye on this one as development progresses.

The description explicitly flags extensive visual effects work as a core component of the production, which is entirely consistent with both the source material and Mongkolsiri's previous films. 'Inhuman Kiss' leaned heavily on practical and digital effects to realize its supernatural imagery, and 'Hunger' demonstrated Mongkolsiri's comfort working with ambitious production design under pressure. For a story built around animated, seemingly living hair used as an instrument of horror, the VFX pipeline will be a significant department, and supervisors, VFX producers, and on-set VFX coordinators should take note early. The production's genre ambitions and international distribution setup also suggest this will not be a micro-budget affair. A co-production of this structure, pulling resources from three separate studio entities across three countries, typically supports a budget level that allows for meaningful department size and a real crew hire.

With a 2027 production start on the horizon and the project currently sitting in early development, there is plenty of time to position yourself before the hiring window opens. That said, productions of this scale and complexity begin their key department conversations earlier than many people expect, particularly when VFX is central to the story. ProductionList.com carries the full listing for 'The Long Hair In The Attic,' including production company contacts and any crew and scheduling updates as they are confirmed. Bookmark it now, check back as the project moves through development and into pre-production, and make sure your reel is ready when this one starts looking for its team.

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