Written by Alvin Schwartz and illustrated by Stephen Gammell, the Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark books terrified a generation of kids, but make no mistake, the stories were very much kid-friendly frights that didn’t include any rated “R” material. Appropriately, this year’s movie adaptation is set to be a PG-13 affair, ensuring teens get to experience the thrills.

At an event yesterday, director André Øvredal (Trollhunter, The Autopsy of Jane Doe) and producer Guillermo del Toro touched upon the material-appropriate MPAA rating.

“There’s no blood in this movie,” Øvredal noted, calling the film “Amblin-esque.” He continued, “We didn’t wanna go too young, but we wanted to honor the fact that the books are for a younger audience. We wanted to honor the material and the stories.”

Del Toro added, “We wanted to make a family adventure. I want this to be a nice family horror film. A lot of movies simplify kids and make them cute, skateboarding dudes who say one-liners and never get killed. In my movies, kids do die. They are more frail, but at the same, more complex, and they see that darkness, and that extends to this movie.”

Hat tip to Vulture for the quotes.

In this summer’s adaptation…

A group of young teens must solve the mystery surrounding sudden and macabre deaths in their small town.

“It’s 1968 in America. Change is blowing in the wind…but seemingly far removed from the unrest in the cities is the small town of Mill Valley where for generations, the shadow of the Bellows family has loomed large. It is in their mansion on the edge of town that Sarah, a young girl with horrible secrets, turned her tortured life into a series of scary stories, written in a book that has transcended time—stories that have a way of becoming all too real for a group of teenagers who discover Sarah’s terrifying tome.”

Zoe Colletti, Michael Garza, Gabriel Rush, Austin Abrams, Dean Norris, Kathleen Pollard, Gil Bellows, Lorraine Toussaint, Austin Zajur and Natalie Ganzhorn star.

Daniel Hageman & Kevin Hageman and Guillermo del Toro wrote the script.

The stories come to life on August 9th, 2019.