Movies
Gore Verbinski Off ‘Bioshock’ Adaptation?
Some very disheartening news comes in via the LA Times this morning as they’re reporting director Gore Verbinski (The Ring, Pirates of the Caribbean) may be off of Bioshock, Universal’s video game adaptation that’s been hitting some rough waters as of late. While the news isn’t horribly grim, the LA Times writes the reason for his departure is that Verbinski is becoming more interested in producing, but still implies that the project might not happen (boo!).
From the LA Times:
“When most people think “Gore Verbinski and video games,” they think Bioshock, the 2007 hit video game about an underwater dystopia that he signed on to direct as a film for Universal last year.
But Verbinski isn’t just interested in adapting video games into movies. Speaking to the Los Angeles Times in advance of this week’s E3 conference, the “Pirates of the Caribbean” director explained that he instead wants to produce them. Since first introducing himself to the game industry at least year’s D.I.C.E. conference, Verbinski has hired a video game designer, Will Stahl from “Star Wars: Battlefront” maker Pandemic Studios, to work at his Blind Wink production company. Blind Wink now has five game projects in development, one of which it is building as a prototype.
Hiring a game designer to work on staff is unusual enough for a film production company. But in another twist, Blind Wink’s first look deal with Universal Pictures, which it signed last year, also includes video games. That means the studio, which recently released its first self-financed game, “Wanted: Weapons of Fate,” could publish or co-publish one of Blind Wink’s games in the future.
Verbinski, who is currently working on the animated film “Rango,” isn’t confident about “Bioshock’s” making it to the big screen. It’s been previously reported that the film is on hold due to concerns about its escalating budget. Verbinski tells the Times that it could probably get made, if it is shot in one of those foreign countries that offer a generous tax credit. And he’s not sure whether he wants to go overseas for the year-plus it would require to make it.
Our conversation with the reluctant “Bioshock” director is part of a larger story in tomorrow’s Times about the new efforts among film industry hotshots — including Verbinski, Jerry Bruckheimer, Thomas Tull and Zack Snyder — and newly-hired executives at some of the big studios, to produce video games. They’re determined to succeed where so many in Hollywood have failed before. You can read the entire story right here.”
Or you can click here for a preview of the full interview.
Movies
Art Meets Leslie – David Howard Thornton Joins ‘Behind the Mask II: The Return of Leslie Vernon’
Leslie Vernon will be back in the upcoming Behind the Mask II: The Return of Leslie Vernon, and Variety reports that David Howard Thornton (Terrifier) has joined the cast.
David Howard Thornton is said to be featured in a “key role.” Stay tuned for more.
“David is one of the defining faces of the modern slasher era,” returning director Scott Glosserman said in a statement to Variety. “If Behind the Mask was about deconstructing the classic rules, then a sequel 20 years later has to reckon with what the genre has become.”
Glosserman adds, “Bringing David into Leslie’s world lets us put the old guard and the new blood in direct conversation, which is exactly where this movie should live.”
The upcoming slasher sequel picks up in a horror landscape that has changed dramatically since Leslie first emerged, as the old rules of the genre collide with a new wave of modern slashers, viral killers, legacy sequels and blood-soaked icons built for the internet age.
It look less than 10 minutes for the Kickstarter campaign for the recently announced Behind the Mask II: The Return of Leslie Vernon to smash through its goal earlier this year.
The stars of the 2006 movie Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon will reunite for the upcoming sequel, with Nathan Baesel, Angela Goethals and Robert Englund confirmed to return as Leslie Vernon, Taylor Gentry, and Doc Halloran, respectively. Scott Glosserman is also back to direct Behind the Mask II, with David J. Stieve back to write the film.
Glosserman previews, “For twenty years, people have asked if Leslie would ever come back. Fans kept this movie alive by sharing it, quoting it, introducing it to their friends, and treating it like something worth holding onto. This sequel is happening because of them.”
In the 2006 meta-slasher, aspiring slasher icon Leslie Vernon gives a documentary crew exclusive access to his life as he plans his reign of terror over the sleepy town of Glen Echo. What’s Leslie Vernon been up to in the past 20 years? And what’s next for the character?
Paper Street Pictures, led by Aaron B. Koontz and Cameron Burns, produces the sequel. Adam F. Goldberg (The Goldbergs, Shelby Oaks) will also serve as an executive producer.
Expect Behind the Mask II: The Return of Leslie Vernon in 2027.
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