Screenhead

Sarcasm is dripping off that title like drool from a fanboy’s mouth when you start talking about the next Guillermo Del Toro movie.

But it’s no less true for the scathing sarcasm–Michael Bay really IS planning yet another remake for his Platinum Dunes studio, and this time, he’s going after…The Tenant.

Yeah, I know, I’m kind of freaked out too.  Frankly, I hadn’t even HEARD of this relic of a bygone era, and had to investigate it.  Amazon didn’t even have it, and only the IMDB could save me here.

It was an old Roman Polanski film, for crying out loud.  It involved a man taking an apartment in which a man had committed suicide, and was apparently the inspiration for David Croenenburg, which proves that it’s going to be about three hundred pounds of weird in a half-pound sack.  Roman Polanski by himself is a catastrophic study in screwed-up but when you consider that this helped MAKE CROENENBURG, well, then there’s nothing to do but just lock up the acid and keep your sponsor on speed dial because your world is about to get horrendously messed up.

So the thought of Michael Bay trying to remake this steaming pile of lunacy just puzzles me.  I actually admit I’m looking forward to it.  What will a complete lack of talent do to a movie that’s such an incredible mindbomb that it made Croenenburg?

I’m so freaked out it’s not even funny.

Agent Smith err… Hugo Weaving has been confirmed to don those elf ears once again as he will reunite with Andy Serkis and Ian McKellen in The Hobbit.

This comes from Guillermo del Toro, who says the trio will all return “… as the roles they originated in the trilogy.”

Weaving played the elf leader Elrond in all three films in the highly popular Lord of the Rings series.

Once you’ve gotten over your nerdgasm, you’ll be pleased to know that the first of the two Hobbit films will open December 2011. Mark your calendars now!

Katie Holmes  is set to star in a film that was scripted by Guillermo del Toro and Mathew Robbins.  Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark is a thriller based on a 1973 ABC telepic centering on a young girl who moves in with her father and his girlfriend. Soon they discover devilish creatures haunt the house.

According to Variety, Del Toro is producing with Mark Johnson and the film will be directed by del Toro protégé Troy Nixey.

Filming will start this summer in Melbourne.

Interestingly, Nixey is a comic book artist and Dark marks his feature directing debut.

Popular director Guillermo del Toro is reported to be in negotiations to produce the horror film Mama for Universal Pictures.

The English-language script is being written by Andy and Barbara Muschietti based on their acclaimed Spanish-language short. Andy is set to direct; Barbara will produce. They are currently working on their script.

While plot details are being kept under wraps, it will follow two girls who are on the run from a ghostly woman who appears to be their mother.

Seeing as how Guillermo del Toro is tied up in New Zealand for the next couple of years with The Hobbit, it appears that a Hellboy 3 may not be possible soon. However, a spinoff may come up.

Talking to MTV News, he revealed that he has given his blessing for another filmmaker to take the director’s chair for a potential B.P.R.D. spinoff while he is occupied with his other projects.

BPRD began in the comics after Hellboy decided to officially leave the bureau. It follows the remaining members as they take on a plague of demonic frogs, amongst other supernatural beings.

Continuing his passion for the weird and fantasy, Guillermo del Toro is set to produce a stop-motion version of Gris Grimly’s Pinocchio.

Grimly is a LA-based artist and storyteller who is known for his darkly whimsical story books. One of them is a take on the famous wooden boy whose nose gets bigger when he lies.

"The idea came from Gris, and everybody loves his book about it,” said del Toro. “The original story is far more perverse and spooky and semi-necrophilia vibe to it in certain aspects. Gris certainly has that vein in him, he wants to do this with that original spookiness in it, we are trying to get it going.”

Grimly himself is set to direct the feature. The Jim Henson Company is supporting the film and is currently working on the screenplay.

Kim Basinger holds her own in this film that Guillermo del Toro produced.  While She Was Out creates a whole new level of strong women roles.  Susan Montford wrote and directed this film, which is based on a short story by Edward Bryant.

Guillermo del Toro may have his hands full right now, but his hands might be getting even more fuller (lame line, I know) as the man might be taking on Slaughterhouse-Five, an experimental book by Kurt Vonnegut.

The book tells the story of a man captured by Germans and put in an old slaughterhouse with other POWs. He is eventually abducted by aliens who know the past and present, but can’t do anything to change it.

Here’s what del Toro had to say:

The book is so experimental in so many ways – now that movies have the possibility of being non-linear, you have so many possibilities to do the book honor by attempting at it. You could not tell that novel if your filmic language was academic. One of the main things is that you can do the juxtapositions of time because the way academic storytelling would tell you is that there are flash-forwards and flashbacks. But the reality is the whole essence of the book is that the character is unstuck in time. Unstuck in time. So you do the implications of what that means, but you are really going into pushing narrative. You’re not watching a flashback and you’re not watching a flash-forward.

This possible project joins the list of many movies del Toro might be doing after The Hobbit films. There’s his new take on Frankenstein, then there’s Lovecraft’s At the Mountains of Madness, and more.

Didn’t I just post something about Guillermo del Toro? This time the director has inked a publishing deal with HarperCollins imprint William Morrow to pen a trilogy of vampire thrillers with Chuck Hogan.

First book, “The Strain,” hits bookstores next summer. Go, del Toro Go!

The story focuses on an invasion of New York City by a vampire virus. Series will trace the roots of the vampire race back to its Old Testament origins.

The books will be published by HarperCollins in the U.K., and a special edition will be published simultaneously in a Spanish-language for the U.S.

Hogan has penned the thrillers “The Standoff,” “The Blood Artists” and “The Killing Moon.” Warner Bros. recently picked up his book “Prince of Thieves” for Ben Affleck to helm and star.

If you’re in New York catch Guillermo del Toro who has joined the New Yorker Festival line-up. He will talk with The New Yorker’s Daniel Zalewski on monsters at 7:30 P.M., October 4th, at the Directors Guild of America (110 West 57th Street, NY, NY).

Guillermo del Toro wrote, directed, and produced the 2006 film “Pan’s Labyrinth,” which won three Academy Awards and became the highest-grossing Spanish-language film in U.S. box-office history. His other films include “Cronos,” “The Devil’s Backbone,” “Blade II,” “Hellboy,” and “Hellboy II: The Golden Army.” His next project will be a two-film adaptation of J. R. R. Tolkien’s “The Hobbit,” to be released in 2011 and 2012.

Daniel Zalewski is the features editor of The New Yorker.
7:30 P.M. Directors Guild of America
110 West 57th Street

Tickets available Wednesday, September 17th, at 12 noon E.T., at festival.newyorker.com or by calling 800-440-6974. Tickets will also be sold during Festival weekend at Festival HQ, at Metropolitan Pavilion, 125 West 18th Street, and at the door.