Some quick directing news hit the world of horror today as two big names have both come and gone regarding their respective projects. First up, we learned that James Wan’s long-time partner in crime Leigh Whannell will make his directorial debut with the upcoming Insidious: Chapter 3. Whannell penned the scripts of the previous two films with Wan so it’s nice to see that the project will still be surrounded by its original creators.
Details on the latest installment are still being kept quiet but it’s quite obvious where this one is headed after how the second film concluded. I’m excited to see what Whannell brings to the table as far as directing is concerned because he’s been working so closely with Wan over the years. It’s definitely going to be interesting to see if he has picked up on any of Wan’s techniques.
Now, onto the not so good news. Universal’s The Mummy reboot has been swirling around for a while now as it has already seen one director bow out back in July of last year. Now, Mama director Andres Muschietti has left the project due to those good ol’ “creative differences”. Apparently, Muschietti wanted to go a much darker tone on the classic tale rather than a more family-friendly action flick that the studio is now aiming for. Seriously, what did they expect when they hired a horror director?
I’m bummed that instead of giving us something scary and original, they will instead be delivering a movie we already saw when Stephen Sommers did it back in 1999. Oh well, you can’t win ‘em all, folks.
Great about Insidious Chapter 3, but I was also bummed to hear about Andres Muschietti leaving the project. He also dropped out of another film to do this one, and that sounded promising–as I recall reading about it, he may return to that one (I hope so). I also read he is not the first director to leave the Mummy reboot. Please, not another Mummy like the one in 1999, where I never once forgot I was watching a bunch of CGI. Just… no. Oh well, we can cross our fingers that Andres Muschietti will move on to a better, creative, original project that scares the shit out of us (and maybe they can work in Javier Botet for creature effects somehow again!
Yea, exactly. The first director to drop out was Len Wiseman. The fact that they already made this movie is what’s annoying. I was hoping for something different and to have more of a horror angle to it. Oh, well.
Cool to see Whannell line up a directing gig. He is a talented dude, so hopefully that transfers to directing as well.
Yea, I agree. He watched one of the best go to work for years, so I’m pretty excited to see how it turns out. Should be solid.