Here we go again, kids . . . I truly hate the fact that Hollywood has been giving me so much to bitch about these days. I feel like the curmudgeon old man standing outside the movie theatre shaking his fist at snickering teens and ranting aloud: "Back in my day you could see a movie for six dollars! And we had real movie stars like Pauly Shore! And there were no dagnabit commercials BEFORE the movie started!" But The Biz, in all its limited memory, is now going to direct ANGEL HEART . . . A film that is barely 20 years old; ironically that's also about the average age of studio execs.
For those unfamiliar with the original film, ANGEL HEART is best described as CHINATOWN meets THE EXORCIST, a noirish private eye story that delves into the occult world of post-WW2 New Orleans (to the remake's intended audience -- That means World War 2, kids). It starred an in-his-heyday Mickey Rourke the seedy detective "Harry Angel", Robert DeNiro as his mysterious client and THE COSBY SHOW'S Lisa Bonet who figures prominently . . . And ends up having Biblical-style sex with "Angel" . . . We're talking blood dripping from the ceilings here!!! The film did spark some controversy with that sex scene not so much for its explicitness but because of the "familiarity" between the two characters. To this day the film remains more a cult hit, but for those who have seen it its considered a horror classic. Most notable is the work of director Sir Alan Parker, who gives The Big Easy a corroded, sinister and despairing feel.
The creative team behind the remake are former New Line big shot, Michael De Luca, Alison Rosenzweig and Michael Gaeta. The trio bought the remake rights from an anonymous UK firm and, in a masterstroke, also picked up the rights to the book, FALLEN ANGEL by William Hjortsberg, on which the film was nominally based.
No director has yet been assigned the project but I'm figuring (purely by current protocol) they'll end up using some one-named "videomaker" who consider color tints and "extreme" camera angles to be major components in storytelling and character development. It'll also be interesting to see which "man-boy" movie star is cast to play the lead. (Say what you want -- And there's plenty -- about Mickey Rourke but the guy is a REAL MAN).
December 15, 2007, 05:26:56 PM
