Do You Know the Bunny Man? Interview with Gabriel Howard

By: Myriam Akbar

As a lifelong slasher fan, I was immediately drawn to the poster of 2025’s psychological horror-thriller film Sugarcane. A man in a flannel and nightmarish bunny mask was reminiscent of 70s horror, putting it on my Tubi must-watch list. The plot follows the race against a Norman Bates-like murderer and trafficking survivor tracing a missing teenage girl, whose fate becomes increasingly formidable by the hour. Sugarcane was produced by the Southeast independent company, Postmortem Films and distributed by Los Angeles-based studio, Buffalo 8. Postmortem Films is known for their grim and gritty storytelling, which certainly speaks to the nature of this project. This is their feature film debut; however, they have eight additional short films.

I had the opportunity to chat with Gabriel Howard, the  “Head of Development” for Postmortem Films. He helps with the progress of all new projects, overseeing them to completion – from conceptualization, to a final shooting of the script. Howard is the writer of Sugarcane; although, this isn’t his first project or venture with the company. He is also attached to their previous short film, Internal Affairs. The key theme explored in their films is the various ways evil is expressed. “There is no one archetype of horror; in fact, it’s quite the opposite,” he says.

Although Howard lives in Florida, he was born and raised in Pennsylvania. He’s 24 years old and describes himself as “persistent, loyal, and soulful.” His earliest memory of discovering his passion for film and horror was when his father introduced to him the film, Alien. Howard found himself hungry for more similar stories due to the thrilling and horrifying nature of the plot. He has two favorite sub-genres, one being psychological. He lists The Silence of the Lambs and the NBC TV series Hannibal as his go-tos. His other favorite is creature features, naming The Thing as a monumental cinematic experience. As for Howard's passion for writing, it developed when he was a child. When his teachers assigned writing prompts that were only 1-2 pages long, he would ask for additional pieces of paper to extend it to 8-10 pages. “From there, I would find any and every excuse to break away and write,” he says. 

Sugarcane was directed by Pat Baker and primarily filmed in North Carolina, as well as Georgia. The inspiration for the film was webcam and live-stream culture, as well as how far we as humans will go against our own humanity to seek approval or survive in the world. “For me, the film explores how people can transform into horrific monstrosities when detached from their own humanity. The villain – the Bunny Man is an example of this: he is a reprehensible antagonist that has understandable human flaws and motivations for the horror he inflicts on others,” Howard explains.

In terms of writing, he says the biggest challenge was balancing sensitive subject matter and attempting to remain informative about this real-life danger. This, along with the goal of accomplishing something that’s entertaining was an obstacle. In regard to producing the film, last-minute changes with location or story sequences became a trial. “The best parts of the film-making process were how any problems that came up could help the film evolve into something better than what we originally envisioned. We had a wonderful cast and crew that contributed to the immense satisfaction of getting the project completed,” Howard shares. 

Since its release, he says that there has been insightful and gratifying support from the audience overall. “I am tremendously honored by the encouragement of the Indie film community, it only fuels us to make better projects moving forward,” Howard says. He’s excited to get right back into it and to give the audience another story from Postmortem. Currently their next feature film, Honeypot is in development with an estimated release in 2027. “My goals moving forward are to never stop creating and learning how I can be better at my craft,” he says.