By Gabriela Isabel Chavez
HOLLYWOOD, CA (Hollywood Today) 8/31/07 ? Camp horror director and outrageous rocker Rob Zombie gives what he calls a ?no guts, no glory? take on ?Halloween,? shedding light upon the ?family drama? behind the murderous Michael Myers. Or more to the point, plenty of guts and gory enough to cap the summer with Labor Day screams.
From the director who introduced us to the deliciously maniacal, serial-killing Firefly family in ?House of 1000 Corpses? and its? shocking sequel ?The Devil?s Rejects,? comes the remake of John Carpenter?s genre classic, ?Halloween.? Zombie was proposed the idea of remaking the 1978 horror picture about a knife-wielding, white-masked boogeyman named Michael Myers. Meyers escapes a sanitarium on Hallow?s Eve to return to his hometown, Haddonfield, Illinois where he murdered his family 17 years earlier. Zombie didn?t take on this project until he thought about the ?depth he could go with young Michael.?
He told Hollywood Today last week that his film is ?different,? although it is ?inspired by the original ?Halloween? but cast like a serious movie,? he looked at the ?human drama? behind Michael Myers as to ?what makes a 10 year old kid do these acts.?
Rob Zombie was not alone in this venture. When Zombie met with Malcolm McDowell, the star of Zombie?s favorite movie, Kubrick?s ?A Clockwork Orange,? it was clear that they both were on the same path to work on a film that was ?uncompromising.?
McDowell was Zombie?s first choice, and as the rocker/director stated, ?the only person I went after? for the role of Dr. Loomis, the doctor who treats Myers in the sanitarium. McDowell brought the role to life, formerly played by Donald Pleasance, by using as inspiration the type of ?ego-maniacal doctor who you meet who thinks they?re brilliant, the doctor who will kill you because they?re an ego-maniac.?
Zombie stated back in July at the San Diego Comicon comic convention is that McDowell never saw the original ?Halloween.? He said he didn?t see it so that he didn?t have Pleasance?s character ?lurking at the back of his mind.? Which is more than the terrified teen audiences in 1978 could say.
Overall, Zombie has a new agenda for this ?Halloween? and a new Meyers played by ?X-Men?s? Sabertooth, Tyler Mane. He focuses on Michael Meyers as a ?central figure? and divides the story into ?three acts?: young Michael and his mother played by Zombie?s wife Sherri Moon, his experience in the sanitarium, and finally the place we are all-too familiar with, Myers? hometown Haddonfield, Illinois also home to Meyers? sister, Laurie Strode- played by newcomer, Scout Taylor-Compton. Overall, in describing his remake, Zombie states, ?if it was anything but horrible and disturbing then I guess I would have failed.?
Zombies future plans include an animation which he describes to be a ?super-hero-monster-sex-comedy? named ?El Superbeasto,? with ?Sideways? star Paul Giammatti as villain ?Dr. Satan.? Zombie also plans on releasing a live album and going on tour in October with a ?huge monster show? that will have ?fire, robots, dancing girls,? and of course all while planning his next film project.
http://www.hollywoodtoday.net/?p=1893
