Just when we thought we had finally escaped Universal’s Dark Universe, those damn public domain monsters just pulls us right back in. Just a couple of weeks after director Leigh Whannell remade The Invisible Man with Elisabeth Moss and a new timely tone for the horror maestros at Blumhouse, the studio is coming back with a new take on Dracula from Destroyer and Jennifer’s Body director Karyn Kusama. This comes from The Hollywood Reporter, which says its sources claim that the new Dracula will follow The Invisible Man’s lead with a modern-day setting and that it will most likely land at Universal (the studio hasn’t picked it up yet, but it has a first-look deal with Blumhouse and THR says it “isn’t about to let one of its iconic monsters escape the fold”). Kusama’s Dracula will also probably have a more reasonable budget than Universal’s last Dracula movie, 2014's Game Of Thrones-y epic with Luke Evans, which seems to be the key with projects like this.
The news of a new Dracula comes just a few days after we heard that James Wan was working on a very Frankenstein-sounding horror movie for Universal. Plus there’s the monster thing Paul Feig is doing… for Universal. And the Invisible Woman movie that Elizabeth Banks is making… for Universal (which is somehow completely unrelated to Elisabeth Moss’ Invisible Man). And the Dracula-related horror movie that Dexter Fletcher and Robert Kirkman are making… for Universal. But please, nobody jump to any conclusions and say anything about some kind of Dark Universe where Universal can revitalize all of its old monster characters and bring them together for some kind of team-up movie. That’s not going to happen. Wink.
No, seriously, it’s not. The Dark Universe is as dead as Count Dracula, who never comes back to life even though it really seemed like he was dead.
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default the homepage to latest. it’s so ugly.
“CHECK, PLEASE!”No, seriously. I’m done. Besides, you’ll never top:Seriously.
I still deeply want to see Kusama’s original cut of AEON FLUX before it got butchered to hell by the studio for being an “expensive art movie”
I’m on board; I’ve been in the tank for Kusama since Girlfight, and I liked her horror/thriller offering, The Invitation, which starred Logan “Poor Man’s Tom Hardy” Marshall-Green (as did Leigh Whannell’s Upgrade).
The Invitation rules!
But will this be told from Mina’s standpoint and reveal surprise surprise, Dracula’s an asshole?
Modern Dracula take: a tech bro becomes convinced he can “disrupt” death and becomes an unholy creature of the night, then gains new victims by giving exclusive TED Talk-like seminars where he first mesmerises and then bites all the attendees. He converts some women into his “brides”, but they go online and claim that they’re totally feminists and that being a bride of Dracula is actually very empowering.
ok but where’s the supernatural twist
I had a dream recently that Universal was making a Dracula movie with a similar tone to the new Invisible Man movie, set in modern day with a sexual assault angle, emphasizing Dracula’s nature as a sexual predator, not just a creature looking for sustenance.
The BBC just did that as a 3-part miniseries, but it was terrible.It was a Moffat/Gatiss piece, which tried ramping up sexual tension between rapey Dracula and sexy Van-Helsing.
Thank you yes, everyone was like “ooh how progressive making Dracula queer” or whatever but, like with True Blood before it making allegories and allusions to gay/queer stuff when your subject is a rapey, disease spreading inhuman evil monster is… misguided at best. Yes the Stoker novel is full of sexual undertones but that’s it because it’s largely puritanical and those things are meant to be bad.
Sample dialogue: “Of all my wives, you’re the first to consent.”
the first two episodes of the BBC Dracula were great …the third…um..not so much..
I thought the castle segment was good, but then the show fell off a cliff (much like Jonathan Harker)
I haven’t watched that one, but I had no idea it went with that angle. I thought most of it was a period piece?
Oops, sorry. I forgot that was a twist >_<
Sure, why not. The bar’s pretty damn low for “modern-day-dracula” atm.
Not Another Vampire Movie …
I dug the new Invisible Man, but it’s hard to imagine how they can do a similarly fresh take on Dracula. With The Invisible Man you can always make your movie about a different Invisible Man, but Dracula is Dracula (except I guess in Dracula 2000 where he was… Judas?). That said, I thought Destroyer was good so I’m happy to see Kusama getting more work.
I hear the remake of Rabid was pretty awful. If they could make this into a kind of Ionesco’s Rhinoceros via vampire hordes with the “tribalism kills” theme it could be pretty dope…and I do love a movie set in a large apartment complex (Rabid, Poltergeist 3, High Rise). “I won’t join you, you’re sucking blood/putting children in cages!”Or just remake Zardoz with vampires, of course
I really want them to do the Dark Universe though. Marvel has nothing on Abbott and Costello meeting Frankie, Drac and Wolfe all in one movie and ending with the Invisible man! 🙂