The Screwfly Solution is a horror video. It first appeared as the seventh episode in the second season of Masters of Horror anthology but is completely self-contained and stand-alone. It is based upon the 1977 science fiction short story of the same name by Alice Sheldon under the alias Raccoona Sheldon, credited in the film as James Tiptree, Jr. Many of the scenes in Sam Hamm’s script are expansions of single lines in this epistolary story. Director Joe Dante read the story in the 1980s and had wanted to make a film version ever since. He presented the story as straight horror, eschewing his usual humour and without using his usual company of stock actors. Jason Priestley and Elliott Gould were the stars.
