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]
