Fangoria reports today that Matt Venne (of WHITE NOISE 2 and PELTS) will be busy this summer with another Warner Bros. remake.
Venne is set to write the screenplay for the remake of 1965’s I SAW WHAT YOU DID, which was directed by William Castle. Castle is certainly a favorite of Hollywood’s for remakes, as THIRTEEN GHOSTS and HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL (both directed by Castle) were also remade in the past. Dark Castle, which handled the remakes THIRTEEN GHOSTS and HOUSE OF WAX, will also produce this remake.
For those who don’t know, the original had two girls (Andi Garrett and Sara Lane), who during a mischievous night of prank calling, dial up a stranger proclaiming ‘I saw what you did, and I know who you are!’ Unbeknownst to them, they’ve called a husband who has just murdered his wife, who soon discovers the callers’ identity. As a gimmick during the film’s run, Castle had theatres fashion their seats with safety belts so audience members could buckle themselves in to prevent leaping out of their seats during the film’s jump scares.
In a world of caller ID, Venne says that while the film had a cool concept, going in to give his pitch to Dark Castle presented a unique challenge: How do you modernize that and use current technology to make it scary? “I’m sure [Dark Castle] would want me to be quiet about those specifics, but I stayed true to the concept. William Castle, I think, was trying to do a Hitchcockian film à la REAR WINDOW, PSYCHO, STRANGERS ON A TRAIN and SHADOW OF A DOUBT—to me, those are the four big films hovering over I SAW WHAT YOU DID. I want to make a turbo-charged Hitchockian horror thriller with suspense, twists and turns, and an incredibly cool killer.” Hopefully Venne has better luck with this one than Jake Wade Wall did with the WHEN A STRANGER CALLS remake.
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