I’m bummed that the vampire thing has taken off like this. Vampires are probably among my least favorite monsters, and now they’re everywhere. And they’re not just sitting at the B-movie edges; Ridley Scott is getting into the vampire game.
Scott’s Gladiator writer, John Logan, has been hired to adapt The Passage, a vampire book by award winning author Justin Cronin (who wrote it under a fake name, natch), with Scott potentially directing. The Variety synopsis:
In the novel, terminally ill patients become healthy after they are
bitten by bats in South America, and the government conducts secret
tests on human subjects to see if the virus can cure illness. The
result is an apocalyptic unleashing of bloodthirsty vampire test
subjects that include death row inmates.
Snore.
It seems unlikely that Scott will direct; at the age of 108 and with 99 other projects on his plate, it’s more likely that Scott is investigating vampirism as a way to live forever and make all the movies he wants to make.
2 comments
Reading this book right now. It's HUGE!
The story seems to be less about the vampires and more about the end of life on earth as we know it, "the passage" of our world so to speak. The before and the after. There is a great deal of focus on the interpersonal relationships of the characters involved in the story as well.
The vampires in the tale are virals, victims of the plague, very similar to the movie version vampires in I Am Legend. However unlike I Am Legend there is a great deal more plot built into The Passage with a much longer story line. So long I could easy see it becoming a mini series or a TV series like what has happened with Legend of the Seeker.
But you're right. The antagonist is mostly vampires. Big, glow in the dark, fangs and claws, eat your whole family and the cat too, COMPLETELY psychotic, vampires.
Like you, my least favorite monsters have always been vampires, but I just finished this book and I have to say, it's really good. The other poster is right – these are more like the I Am Legend movie vampires than the "oh, woe is me" Anne Rice creations.
The book itself feels more like "The Stand" and far less like "Dracula", and the characters are phenomenal. Give it a try.
All of that aside, I'm not sure how I feel about the possibility of a movie. Is the world allowed to just have books anymore, or does everything have to be put on screen?
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