Movies
Acclaimed Zombie Comedy ‘One Cut of the Dead’ is Now Getting an English-Language Remake
The Japanese zombie-comedy One Cut of the Dead from director Shinichiro Ueda was a huge hit out of Fantasia last year, with Meagan raving in her review for us that the film “charms with surprising zombie comedy,” while also adding: “For those looking for laughs and commentary on the passions of low budget horror filmmaking, this is a must watch.”
One Cut of the Dead hasn’t even been released here in the States yet (though the UK Blu-ray is Region Free), but Variety reports today that it’s getting an English-language remake.
Producer Patrick Cunningham (Martha Marcy May Marlene) is spear-heading the remake, said to be filmed on a “very small” budget.
“Most U.S. and Western audiences won’t get to see it. It has only a limited release outside Japan and is not being released in the U.S.,” said Cunningham. “That’s such a shame for a film this fun and original. The goal is for as many people as possible to see [the remake]. We will know more about the direction it will take once we have attached a writer and director.”
In the film, things go badly for a hack director and film crew shooting a low budget zombie movie in an abandoned WWII Japanese facility, when they are attacked by real zombies.
Two things that have proven to be pretty dependable at the box office in recent years are horror movies and Christopher Nolan movies. With Nolan’s The Odyssey absolutely dominating the box office this past weekend, many fans of Nolan’s work have been left hungry for a Nolan-directed horror movie. After all, The Odyssey does whet the appetite for Nolan nightmare fuel.
Christopher Nolan has brushed up against the horror genre in the past with 2002 thriller Insomnia, but does he have any interest in someday making a full-on horror movie?
Nolan tells the Empire Podcast in a new chat, “I’ve always been interested in doing a horror film.”
“But horror is most successful when the conceptual framework of whatever the story is is just so undeniable. I think there are very few really great horror movies,” Nolan continues.
So why hasn’t Christopher Nolan directed a horror movie yet?
He explains to Empire, “I’ve never clicked with a particular idea or concept that worked for me. I love the genre. Of all genres, it’s the most visceral. Where the direct response to the audience is the most important. That is to say, you’re trying to make people literally feel something in their bones about what’s going on on-screen.”
Nolan calls horror “a genre in which experimentation is demanded.” He explains, “I go to see a lot of horror films with my kids these days, and you’ll see things in the first half an hour, 45 minutes of any horror film that you’d never see in another genre. Risks that are taken. Dangerous approaches to things. Admittedly, a lot of movies can’t sustain that to the end. But in the horror genre, that kind of innovation is not just respected – it’s really demanded.”
Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey is now playing in theaters.
Cillian Murphy as Scarecrow in Christopher Nolan’s ‘The Dark Knight’ (2008)
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