It’s a given in life that some things that begin don’t necessarily finish the way we would want. We start home modeling projects that should take months but instead take years. We’ll work feverishly on a novel only to hit ‘Save’ and then not open it ever again. It’s not necessarily a bad thing that events go that route, it’s just how it goes.
This is also how it goes with movies. Some get big announcements and the community is thrown into a frenzy of excitement. “This movie is getting made? Yes! I’ve been waiting so long!” or “Holy shit, this sounds so good! I can’t wait to see what it looks like!” Alas, those people suffer disappointment when a title gets cancelled, languishes in developmental hell, or simply fades away, never to be heard from again.
I want to talk about a few of these movies today and hear your thoughts on the matter. Have there been movies announced that never came to fruition and you still get upset thinking about it? I know I do as you can see by my suggestions below.
Clive Barker’s The Thief of Always
Many of you know how much love I have for this book. The story of a young boy who fights against an entity that steals away over 30 years that he could’ve spent with his family, the book was supposed to be turned into a movie nearly two decades ago. I’m still waiting for any sort of adaptation, as it was at one point supposed to be an animated feature and then evolved into a live action one. Tick tock…
Richard Raaphorst’s Worst Case Scenario
Remember this really awesome teaser that came out over a decade ago? It basically was another Nazi zombie movie but the monsters looked SO cool! The movie never got the funding necessary for production but Raaphorst would later go on to make Frankenstein’s Army, a movie I was sorely disappointed by. Still, Raaphorst has shown that he can get the look of this kind of movie down, so maybe one day Worst Case Scenario will get made and we’ll get something really special!
David Fincher’s Torso
David Fincher returning to the serial killer thriller/horror world? Yes please! It’s been over 10 years since it was announced? Oh…
The last anyone heard of this project, David Lowery (Ain’t Them bodies Saints) was slated to write and direct. Since then, crickets are chirping.
Guillermo del Toro’s At the Mountains of Madness
What a shame this never got made. I know that many people weren’t into the idea of Tom Cruise being the main character but I thought it was an inspired move. The guy is a box office draw AND he’s genuinely a great actor. But even if we cast that to the side, the thought of del Toro tackling an actual Lovecraft story seemed like a match made in heaven. His other works have shown that he can create the right look, the right atmosphere, for such an endeavor, meaning we’d have gotten a film that could’ve redefined the term “epic”. Such a loss.
