The Weinsteins Remaking ‘An American Werewolf In London?’

Sigh…

The news of remakes of classic horror movies just keeps on coming with word that Dimension Films (The Weinstein Company’s genre film division) have acquired the rights to remake An American Werewolf in London.

Screen Rant reported last June that original American Werewolf director, John Landis, said that Hollywood has been wanting to remake his movie for ages, but the fact that he owned the rights were stopping them. Well, it appears Landis has sadly buckled and sold those rights, which will eventually deliver us a remake of his horror masterpiece.

Bloody Disgusting has nabbed the exclusive that Dimension has acquired the remake rights to An American Werewolf in London – BD was also the site that reported on the rumblings of AAWIL remake over a year ago. Some of you out there may remember the horrible sequel to Landis’ movie that was released in 1997, entitled An American Werewolf in Paris – please avoid it at all costs and seek out the original.

Even if you’re not a hardcore horror movie fan (a description I would apply to myself), Landis’ original An American Werewolf in London is an absolute must-see (it’s worth it for the werewolf transformation scene alone).

In case you don’t know (and if you don’t, what are you still doing reading this instead of going out and renting or buying the movie right now?) the original story follows two American backpackers as they make their way through the English (Yorkshire) moors. They are attacked by a werewolf and one of them is killed, but the other is mauled and before long starts to realize that the werewolf attack may have affected him in more ways than he first realized. It’s a great plot and a tremendous horror movie, and it  saddens me that they’re remaking it.

I will make concessions for remakes if a particular idea truly warrants it – maybe the original had a great idea but didn’t make the most of it; maybe the effects could use an update; maybe the original is flat-out bad and therefore the remake couldn’t do any worse. Whatever the reason, there are occasions when I don’t mind a remake. But in the case of An American Werewolf in London, is there really any reason that we need a remake? IMHO they’re never going to top the original.

Halloween, Halloween II, The Amityville Horror, Black Christmas, the upcoming Hellraiser and now An American Werewolf in London – and those are just the horror remakes/updates the Weinsteins have made happen!

Sigh…

What do you think of the idea of remaking An American Werewolf in London? Are you sick of all these remakes or do you not mind them?

An American Werewolf in London doesn’t have a release date as of yet.

Sources: BloodyDisgusting (via /Film)