GhostHousePictures

The use of 3D in horror needs to be carefully chosen. The recent bit of news discussing the acquisition of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre rights by Twisted Pictures from Platinum Dunes revealed that the newest entry will be in 3D, leading me to believe that 3D technology is being applied willy-nilly to horror films. Although I object to 3D horror films in general, I am looking forward to see the application of the technology to Burst 3D.

According to Bloody-Disgusting, Lionsgate, in association with Ghost House Pictures, has announced that Neil Marshall will replace Daniel Calparsoro in the director's chair for the horror/thriller written Gary Dauberman about a group of strangers stranded in a lodge begin to explode one-by-one, presumably by an unseen malevolent force; which gives us a visual quite appropriate for the 3D technology.

The film will be produced by Sam Raimi and longtime collaborator/producer Rob Tapert, the two men behind Ghost House Pictures, and comes hot off the heels of the success of My Bloody Valentine 3D, another Lionsgate production. The announcement was made in part by co-Chief Operating Officer of Lionsgate Joe Drake, who was also a co-founder of Ghost House Pictures with Raimi and Tapert.

I think Sam Raimi and Guillermo del Toro are in a secret competition to see who can be involved with the most projects simultaneously. del Toro may have him beat in the feature film department, but when you factor in Raimi's TV shows (ugh, "Legend of the Seeker") and the Ghost House theatrical and straight-to-video arms, it may actually push the Evil Dead magnate into the lead. And Now we can add a rampaging Yeti (!) to Raimi's already-crowded producers docket.

The film, Refuge, will be directed by an aspiring UK filmmaker by the name of Corin Hardy. The Hollywood Reporter doesn't explain how the unknown Hardy won the attention of Raimi's Ghost House Pictures production outfit, but whatever they've seen has convinced them to throw in with Mandate on giving the film a helping hand. THR describes the project succinctly:

"Refuge centers on a remote town terrorized by a Yeti, the mythological creature native to the mountains of the Himalayas. Hardy will direct from a script by fellow British writer Tom De Ville; both are repped by Paradigm's Marc Helwig and Trevor Astbury. Meanwhile, Blum's Blumhouse Prods. will finance a short film with the same premise as the "Refuge" feature. Hardy and De Ville will work on that as well. The idea is to offer a teaser that can help Hardy refine his vision even as the script is being developed."

That's about it on the details for now. Will it be as awesome as Abominable, one of many, many, many movies people give me crap for loving? Doubtful, but any story about our friendly, hairy hominids in the woods is a story I'll keep an eye out for.

Ghost House Pictures may not win over hardcore horror fans in movie theaters, what with all the PG-13 Grudge filled Messenger Boogeymen (a few more in the vein of Drag Me To Hell couldn't hurt, though), but their DVD branding Ghost House Underground is a different story. Created in 2008 as a collaboration with Lionsgate Home Entertainment, you may remember last October GHU went all in with a round of eight titles to prove to fans their intent to give straight-to-DVD sequels and independent gems a safe haven in the retail world. Greg Bishop's blast of fun Dance of the Dead was easily the cream of the crop, but No Man's Land: Rise of the Reeker and The Substitute are both solid titles that may have gotten the shaft in American markets were it not for GHU.

Which brings us to 2009 and the first batch of titles announced for this October on both DVD and Blu-ray: Seventh Moon, The Thaw, Offspring, and The Children., all four of which are must-see titles for me. Despite playing to mixed acclaim at a few festivals, I'm looking forward to the Amy Smart-starring Seventh Moon, directed by Eduardo Sanchez. Even putting aside his contribution to The Blair Witch Project, Sanchez's first solo film Altered banked enough credit with me to give him the benefit of the doubt on his China set haunter. I haven't heard early talk about either The Thaw or Offspring, but the former has Val Kilmer in it and is about a new biological terror that squirms out of a frozen core sample while the latter is an adaptation of Jack Ketchum's novel about marauding cannibals. Can't complain too much on those two fronts. Then of course, we have Tom Shankland's The Children.