Ex-DC Film Boss Officially Launches New Horror Company With Paramount

Former DC Films boss Walter Hamada has launched his previously-announced new production banner, 18hz Productions, which will provide horror content to Paramount Pictures. Hamada recruited his Smile collaborator Nathan Samdahl from Paramount itself for the imprint, and also hired creative executive Nick Romano, according to a story at The Hollywood Reporter. The name of the studio itself is a nod to 18.98hz, known as the "ghost frequency," which is subaudible to most humans and has been said to cause hallucinations associated with paranormal sightings. Hamada and Samdahl, off the success of Smile, are hoping to rival small horror studiios with big returns like Blumhouse (and to an extent A24).

Hamada started his film career with TriStar in the 1990s, and moved through the industry, making waves and getting promoted upward. From 2007 until 2017, he ran the New Line imprint for Warner Bros., which has a heavy focus on genre and horror productions.

"Nathan's work on hit genre movies like Paramount's Smile, 10 Cloverfield Lane and A Quiet Place as well as his extensive filmmaker relationships make him the perfect addition to the team. I'm lucky the stars aligned and I was able to get him," said Hamada in a statement. "Nick is a true horror fan and his passion for the genre is contagious. Together they will be instrumental in making 18hz the home for horror."

Samdahl has a long history with Paramount, working for the compnay in a variety of roles, while Hamada has a history with Romano, having worked with him at New Line.

"With his track record for groundbreaking success, Walter is the ideal partner and visionary to build out our mainstream horror genre franchise business," Paramount Pictures president and CEO Brian Robbins said when the deal was first announced. "As evidenced by the fantastic performance of Smile, there is a tremendous appetite for original, high-concept storytelling in the global marketplace, and we look forward to a long and successful partnership." 

Hamada added, "I am thrilled to collaborate with Paramount Pictures with the singular goal of creating exceptional movies in the horror genre. Over the course of my career, nothing has been more gratifying than discovering emerging, first-time filmmakers and writers and unleashing their brilliance in a studio setting. Thank you to Brian and the entire team at Paramount Pictures for this tremendous opportunity, I can't wait to get started."

Hamada was in charge of DC Films from January 2018 until late 2022, but was never able to pull it back from the brink of chaos. By the time he came on board, the Justice League debacle had happened and DC was facing a never-ending series of unfavorable comparisons to Marvel, and during Hamada's time, they never had the kind of breakout critical and commercial success studio executives hoped would right the ship.

After Discovery acquired Warner Bros., and CEO David Zaslav started talking about a radical reworking of DC, rumors started to circulate that Hamada would leave. He did so shortly after WBD announced plans to scrap the Batgirl movie, which Hamada had executive produced, for a tax writedown. Shortly after his departure, Warner Bros. Discovery announced that James Gunn and Peter Safran, who had produced The Suicide Squad for Hamada, would take over as co-CEOs of a newly-founded DC Studios, which ostensibly will give them more autonomy from the meddling studio executives who made life harder for DC from 2015 to present.