Wednesday, March 08, 2006

Roth takes on The Cell


I'm in the middle of this book right now and I'm having trouble getting into it. It's true that it's more reminiscent of his older works but I guess I’m just kind of tired of King. I’d rather just read his short stories, which rarely disappoint.

From Aintitcoolnews, "some exciting news for us Stephen King fans. CELL is King's best (non-Dark Tower) book in a while. When I reviewed it I mentioned how it'd make a great adaptation. It seems Dimension agrees and has picked up the rights for noneother than talkback whipping boy Eli Roth!
CELL is about a pulse that goes out over cell phones. Anyone who hears it becomes insane and starts attacking and eating any human being. It's very much King's stab at a zombie story. It's great stuff and it'll definitely be the biggest undertaking Roth has had up to this point.
I got in touch with the man and told him not to fuck up the movie. He sent comments back about the project and now I give them to you:
I fucking LOVE that book. Such a smart take on the zombie movie. I am so psyched to do it. I think you can really do almost a cross between the 'Dawn of the Dead' remake with a 'Roland Emmerich' approach (for lack of a better reference) where you show it happening all over the world. When the pulse hits, I wanna see it hit EVERYWHERE. In restaurants, in movie theaters, at sports events, all the places that people drive you crazy when they're talking on their cell phones. I see total armageddon. People going crazy killing each other - everyone at once - all over the world. Cars smashing into each other, people getting stabbed, throats getting ripped out. The one thing I always wanted to see in zombie movies is the actual moment the plague hits, and not just in one spot, but everywhere. You usually get flashes of it happening around the world on news broadcasts, but you never actually get to experience it happening everywhere. Then as the phone crazies start to change and mutate, the story gets pared down to a story about human survival in the post-apocalyptic world ruled by phone crazies. I'm so excited, I wish the script was ready right now so I could start production. But it'll get written (or at least a draft will) while I'm doing HOSTEL 2, and then I can go right into it. It should feel like an ultra-violent event movie. FUCK this is gonna be so damn fun!!!!!!! I can't wait!!!!!
There you have it. Now, don't fuck it up!"

2 comments:

Octopunk said...

"The one thing I always wanted to see in zombie movies is the actual moment the plague hits, and not just in one spot, but everywhere."

That's a good point. This simultaneous mass zombification makes that possible, and also avoids the "how did they freakin' TAKE OVER?" question that plagues most zombie movies.

JPX said...

Yeah the opening of this book addresses that "moment" and it's pretty damn cool. You can read it right here: http://www.ew.com/ew/report/0,6115,1150884_5_0_,00.html

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