Mark Romanek Quits The Wolfman

For the last few years Universal Pictures have been raiding their vaults and trying to find different ways of revitalizing their old horror icons. We’ve had the Mummy movies (the third is out this year) and Van Helsing tried to merge Dracula, Frankenstein and The Wolfman, but the final product wasn’t a huge success (that’s a tiny understatement, but lets not get into that).

The latest feature in the pipeline is The Wolfman, which is about the, er… Wolfman. The film is due to star the powerhouse acting combo of Benicio Del Torro and Anthony Hopkins, with make-up by the legendary Rick Baker.

Until today the film was due to be directed by Mark Romanek (One Hour Photo), but now he has quit the project over the film’s budget.

According to the opinionated Nikki Finke’s Deadline Hollywood Daily, Romanek left the film because he couldn’t make the film for $100 million dollars.

I know how he feels, I reckon I couldn’t make a movie for under $300 million.

Seriously, though, I find this a bit crazy. Finke’s source states:

“He’s a purist, an artiste, an exquisite craftsman, but he just had a budget schedule he couldn’t accommodate.”

If this is true, I can think of a few words to describe him, the cleanest being “idiot.” The man must be howling mad.

As the film has a release date of February 13 2009, they’d better get a new director, fast!

Just thank the Lord that Stephen Sommers is already directing G.I Joe.

Who do you guys think should step in?

I’d like to see Richard Donner return to the horror genre, but I’m old school.

Source: deadlinehollywooddaily