Director Rob Zombie‘s sequel remake Halloween II is being released in theaters today, and already, negative feedback is flowing strong. As with any director who tries to take a classic of any genre and remake it, moviegoers need to be truly blown away for it to find success, and so far, Zombie hasn’t done so with the Halloween franchise. Instead of retracting back to his original concepts in the realms of shock horror (House of 1000 Corpses, The Devil’s Rejects), it’s being reported that Zombie will be moving right into another classic horror remake: The Blob.
The 1958 movie tells the story of a mysterious object landing on Earth that turns out to be a gelatinous red blob that absorbs human beings and grows huge as it moves along. The Blob has been remade before — with an updated version in 1988 — but it appears that Zombie’s version will be a true remake with a bold, bold move.
Here’s what Rob Zombie had to say:
My intention is not to have a big red blobby thing — that’s the first thing I want to change. That gigantic Jello-looking thing might have been scary to audiences in the 1950s, but people would laugh now.
I’d been looking to break out of the horror genre, and this really is a science fiction movie about a thing from outer space. I intend to make it scary, and the great thing is I have the freedom once again to take it in any crazy direction I want to.
The director does indeed have a point that people might laugh at a giant red blob today, but at the same time, that IS what the Blob looks like, so changing it is immediately screwing with classic material — sort of like Michael Myers without a mask or something.
If I had to take a shot-in-the-dark guess as to where Zombie might go with it, I might look to a movie like Creepshow 2, which featured a short about a black, gooey mass in a lake that latched onto unsuspecting teens who were never to be seen again. Seems more up Zombie’s alley to have a scary-looking black mass moving quickly and unseen through whatever town it lands in.
As the director says above, the movie will be more of a science fiction movie than a horror movie, but will still be really scary. Reports indicate that producers want to deliver an R-rated version of the film (not sure if Zombie is capable of anything less, or if I would even want to see anything less from him) that will cost around $30 Million. They hope to replicate movies like District 9, which is blowing minds with its expensive big-budget look and minuscule $30 Million price tag.
[Source: Variety]
“They hope to replicate movies like District 9, which is blowing minds with its expensive big-budget look and minuscule $30 Million price tag.”
I don’t think District 9 is blowing people’s minds because of it’s high-quality, low-priced look. I think it’s blowing people’s minds because it’s good. It terrifies me that Hollywood will once again miss the point entirely, and latch on to what they see as a new formula: Make it look good, but keep it cheap, and we’ll have an automatic hit. Of course, there’s no logic behind that sentence at all, but since when has Hollywood relied on logic?
District 9 succeeds because It has an engaging story with a plot that’s driven by characters’ motivations. Special effects serve the story, they don’t lead it. The dialogue is smart, it assumes the audience members have brains and can figure things out on their own. It does everything a movie like Transformers, for instance, utterly fails to do.
As for the Blob… I guess we’ll wait and see.
Comment by Doc Atomic — August 29, 2009 @ 1:08 am
It wasn’t being insinuated that the only good thing about District 9 was its great effects/low budget dream pairing.
That’s just one of the many things about the movie that is “blowing minds,” and the only part relevant to this particular story.
Comment by The Movie God — August 29, 2009 @ 2:36 pm
If the blob won’t be a blob then you can’t call the flick blob! Sounds to me like robs gunning for the deadly alien spawn/return of vibe vibe.
Comment by korollocke — August 29, 2009 @ 5:28 pm
Zombie doesn’t have an original thought of his own, does he? Every movie he’s made is a lame “reimagining” of a better film.
House of 1,000 Corpses was a rip off of Texas Chain Saw Massacre
Devil’s Rejects was a rip off of Natural Born Killers
Halloween… he turned the embodiment of pure evil into a bullied kid from a crappy family.
Halloween II… how creative, he took the plot from Halloween 5 and the ending from Halloween 4.
Comment by WordSlinger — September 2, 2009 @ 9:38 pm
I think the one movie that needs to be re done is critters and zombie could do some twisted things with that one for sure
Comment by anthony — September 11, 2009 @ 8:30 am