Ex New Line exec and producer extraordinaire Michael De Luca (BOOGIE NIGHTS, SE7EN) took part in a loooooonng interview over at Collider, where he spoke about a gaggle of upcoming (and past) projects. It’s a very interesting conversation, but let’s just cut to the stuff you came here for.
First up, PRIEST – a project that’s been around since ’05:
“Priest” is a genre-blending movie. It’s kind of like a sci-fi horror film about a group of specially trained priests that hunt down vampires in kind of a post-apocalyptic wasteland.
Don’t get your hopes up for this to hit theaters anytime soon, though. De Luca goes on to say: Screen Gems hopes it can be a franchise for them so it is fast-track to the extent that we’d like to get a director on it sooner than later but it’s currently not out to anyone and we don’t have anybody on it.
De Luca then talks about another vampire project, this one sounds like it has real potential: DRACULA YEAR ZERO, which is set to be helmed by Alex Proyas (who I’ll forgive for I, ROBOT if this goes well).
“Dracula Year Zero” is a origin story for kind of an origin story for Prince Vlad of Transylvania and how he came to be a vampire and what were the circumstances surrounding his transition from you know ruler of this modest country to King of the Undead.
The script was an ingenious blend of “Braveheart” and a horror film. Prince Vlad is positioned as a young ruler who to protect his kingdom from the tyranny of the invading Turk army allows himself to become a vampire and in doing so ends up defeating the invading Turks but is now stuck being Dracula for the rest of his undead life.
It’s Dracula as a warrior prince so it’s Dracula as Gladiator or Dracula as Braveheart.
While I honestly think Francis Ford Coppola told the Count’s tale as well as anyone could with BRAM STOKER’S DRACULA (I know I might not have many supporters on that one), I’m still digging on this concept. A “horror” BRAVEHEART? What’s not to like?
Speaking of Bram Stoker’s Dracula – Winona Ryder’s hot!
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