Monday, February 07, 2011

This movie is dead to me...



Pulled this off Gorezone.net...

** Tom Cruise wants AT THE MOUNTAIN OF MADNESS: During promotion for SANCTUM, James Cameron was asked whether Tom Cruise has signed onto Guillermo del Toro's big screen adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft's AT THE MOUNTAIN OF MADNESS which Cameron is producing. Cruise and James McAvoy have been rumored for the lead role in the film in the past month, a claim McAvoy recently denied when he was asked about the project.

As for Cruise? Cameron told MTV News "Tom does want to do the picture. I don't think we have a deal with him yet, but we're hoping to get that closed soon. Guillermo is madly working on a new draft of the script. Hopefully we'll be shooting by June or July." del Toro and his writing partner Matthew Robbins penned the screenplay back in the very late 90's and the pair have been tweaking every now and then ever since. (thanks to DarkHorizons.com)

This movie is dead to me...

I love Lovecraft, I love Guillermo del Toro's work, I even had some breif e-mail contact with him a few years ago when researching a gothic horror & Lovecraft segment for The Ministry of Fear, and then his name popped up when I visited H.R. Giger at his home in Zurich. It was Giger who told me he had met with Del Toro to discuss AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS.

To put it into context - Giger and I talked a lot about Lovecraft and the possible influence his writing had been on Giger, one of the angles to my interview with him. This lead us to discuss how he shared a Lovecraft interest with Dan O'Bannon who also was into the Cthulhu mythos and how Alien sprang from there... [That's the movie Alien, not Giger's Biomechanoids which where already there before Alien] ...and other Lovecraftian movies like John Carpenter's The Thing and At the Mouth of Madness, which obviously lead us to del Toro's "announced" movie.

I was giddy as a kiddy on christmas, and was so from then on. Somewhere inside me I found a satisfaction when del Toro walked off The Hobbit as I imagined that now he'd get himself onto the mountains of madness... but then the king of the fucking world Capt. Jim Cameron came onboard, and with the Giger-Aliens debacle in mind, it was a fair bet that Giger would be out...

But OK despite a terrible loss for such a promising paring of two of the most important visual minds in a hundred years - YEAH JUST IMAGINE WHAT THE HELL THAT MOVIE WOULD HAVE LOOKED LIKE! HOLY SHOGGOTH! - perhaps Cameron may be able to appreciate the craftsmanship of the artist that is Guillermo del Toro is after all, and theirs a chance that AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS could still come off being a del Toro flick after all...

But then this shit hit the fan...

No Fucking way. NO FUCKING WAY! With J.C. and Tom Cruise on this mission, it's gonna become a stinking turd of a flick. The one that makes me loose all faith in Guilermo del Toro. The one that alienates his fans. The one where he starts dancing to someone else's tune instead of following his own notes... because Cameron and Cruise are not equal to trippy, creepy, mindfucking visually stunning movie, but more synonymous with big, explosive, crappy, predictable, action garbage where Tom Cruise saves the world, kicks monster ass and leaves the source material raped beyond recognition. Get ready for smiley happy ending with group hugs for all surviving expedition members!

It's a lost cause. This movie is dead to me. Despite the probable Mike Mignola artwork for the poster, despite the funky effects and set designs and Doug Jones in all his wonderful creature suits, despite the supposedly confirmed participation of Ron Perlman... this movie is dead to me.

Perhaps they where all right when they said it was unfilmable, all I can hope for now is that del Toro proves me wrong.

11 comments:

Ninja Dixon said...

It's been known for a long time that Cruise want to get involved in that movie.

It can be good, Cruise can be very very good. He just needs a strong director that not gives him EVERY scene - like John Woo did in Mission Impossible 2 for example.

I'm looking forward to it, but I'm one of those mainstream-guys :)

CiNEZiLLA said...

YOu are so fucking spot on there Dixon! He does need a strong director. I do hope that it comes out as a fucking massive movie, but I'm afraid it won't. Perhaps the CGI will keep me from paying attention to the rest of the movie! ;)

Nah, I do hope that it works. Then again I was convinced that Let Me In would blow and then I liked it when I saw that! So who knows! :D

Japanflix said...

Compelling argument. I hope to hell and high heaven that your wrong. But Tom Cruise...if he can take the back seat on this one there may be hope. it's just that he doesn't seem like an person who really can.

CiNEZiLLA said...

Oh I'm sure that a strong director can keep him on the ground, and I too hope that I'm wrong, because this could be an impressive movie. But headless chickens tend to run around spastically as they try to keep control and end up being in the way... and dead.

Johannes Pinter said...

I do believe it can work too. Cruise knows (through the nonsuccess of KNIGHT AND DAY) that he is no longer a bankable action name - there is a reason why they replace him with the younger Jeremy Renner in the fourth installment of MI. TC needs to break new grounds as he's getting older, and that is by doing more mature roles like the one in MAGNOLIA.
So I believe he will let Del Toro do his movie, and I do believe it will be good.

And Dixon: stop being so mainstream :)

CiNEZiLLA said...

I hope that is the case! J.P.

And congratulations on selling your movie! I'll be looking forward to checking it out!

:)

Johannes Pinter said...

Thanks Jason!

chris said...

It is lousy news. I groaned aloud when I read it the other day. I thought McAvoy would be perfect for the part too.

My expectations are drastically lowered, but I'll still hold out some hope that - as your other esteemed readers have pointed out - Cruise (and Jim) can take a back seat, and not make this movie all about them.

Aylmer said...

odd that my username has come up as Chris above?

CiNEZiLLA said...

That is really fucking odd!
It don't link out to anything either.....

that's perhaps what you get for badmouthig the Cruise and Cthulhu.... ;)

I'll delete it and repost it from myself if you want me to... just let me know.

Aylmer said...

..."badmouthing the Cruise and Cthulhu"...

... suddenly all the pieces fall into place. It's so obvious now. Lovecraft faked his own death, got plastic surgery from Nazi scientists... reinvented himself as L. Ron Hubbard. Scientology is the Cult of Cthulhu... Dianetics the Necronomicon written in code.

When ATMOM premiers simultaneously all over the world and Grande Wizard Cruise utters the words "SHOW ME THE OLD ONES!", the universe will turn inside-out and disappear up James Cameron's ass.

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