Universal’s big redo of The Wolf Man, scheduled to start shooting on February 18th, is suddenly in a lot of trouble: director Mark Romanek quit last night.
There’s been a lot of tension between the studio and Romanek for months now, according to inside sources. Universal has apparently been looking over his shoulder the whole time, not entirely sure what they were going to get from the director. Months ago I was hearing rumblings that Romanek was going to be asked to leave the film, but once we got into the new year I figured all systems were go. Apparently not.
With Benecio del Toro, Anthony Hopkins and Emily Blunt all cast, and with the movie weeks from a start date, all of this leaves Universal in a tough situation, although one they might now be used to, after dealing with the defections from State of Play. The studio insists that they’ll find another director and move on, but whoever steps in now will have missed most of the integral creative decision-making and will just be a traffic cop on set. In the meantime I’m hoping that Romanek talks about what happened in his final days on The Wolf Man.
17 comments
CHRIS CUNNINGHAM!! Give him his well deserved feature film debut!!
Mark Romanek should have weathered the storm and made the best movie he could under whatever difficult circumstances were transpiring.
He's to old and too good to only have two (?) feature films to his name. We need more movies from guys like Mark, not vapour-cinema.
Romanek looks like a CHUD contributer.
FUCK! The studio interfering with a talent like Romanek says one thing to me…they want a 'yes man'! I fear for what may happen to this one, one of the only promising relaunches. This gives me the shits!
Has the 'Mummy : Jet Li's Revenge' wrapped? Maybe Rob Cohen needs another gig?
So not cool. I was REALLY looking forward to this one. Now I'd rather the project die before a Reny Harlin-type steps in and works his For-Hire magic.
Aha!
I talked very briefly to my big idol, Rick Baker at the IMAC convention in London Sunday the 27 of January.
He was saying in a interview that he could not tell anything from the set of Wolfman what so ever, but I manged to ask him as he was signing my DVD of "American Werewolf in London, how things were going with his new makeup project.
Suddenly he looked quite distressed for a brief moment and shrugged his shoulders, both in a " I really can comment right now" and " Oh boy, things a tough right now" kinda way. I could see that he was really not pleased about the whole situation and was obviously under a lot of strain.
And now I know why. This is not good news for a film so late in production.
Hopefully the new director will let Benicio wear contact lenses instead of CGI'ing his eyes afterwards.
I hear George Miller is in search of a directing gig. And the Wolf Man can pretty much be considered a talking animal, so it's all good.
Romanek is pretty 1990's. No big loss here if you ask me. None of those guys can touch Chris Cunningham. The only reason he hasn't made a feature film is because he hasn't wanted to make a feature film. But he transcends time, Romanek does not.
Jonathan Glazer could do it. I guess.
nah.
Boycott the project and make them hire Romanek back.
Why is this movie being made? Maybe it's just me, but I see that title and that cast and I get the feeling that I don't even need to see it to know what it's like. I can already hear it creaking under the weight of its own pretentiousness.
From most of what Hollywood spits out, you'd think that no original ideas have been created by mankind after about 25 years ago, and that only about 20 books have ever been written. Come on.
Gotta agree with the last comment. Do we even really need another Wolfman movie? It's played out. Might as well film a Teen Wolf 3.
We do need another Wolfman movie, if it is fucking written by Andrew Kevin Walker, fucking directed by Romanek and fucking starring Benicio Del Toro, with fucking makeup effects by fucking Rick goddamn motherfuckin Baker.
Yes, yes we do need another Wolfman. But it must be THAT Wolfman.
Simple solution: Uwe Boll
I sense that this project will be re-built from the ground up as a Wayans vehicle. Actually, I know for a fact. I have a concrete source. That source: everything 'created' by Committeewood over the last 25 years, especially the last 15. I'd wager my testicals that Romanek wanted to make a, you know, *good* movie, and the studio got their panties in a bunch over how it would be received by the people that love American Idol and Nickleback.
Coming in 2009: Da Wolf Man, Starring Damon Wayans and directed by a rubber plant. I can't wait. To shoot myself in the head.
Gonna post my 1st talkback ever in hopes that someone with power sees it: Too bad there isn't more time for a director to put his stamp on things. I would love to see Roman Polanski or David Cronenberg chew on this nicely-casted period concept.
Cunningham takes a few years between a couple of minute long shorts. Being asked to jump on at the last minute to guide a now sure to be shameful production home isn't likely to happen. Unless he really needs the cash. Plus, if the studio had reservations about Romanek, imagine their opinions on Cunningham.
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