Cinematical

This might be fresh news to many of you, but apparently Fox Searchlight has its heart set on mounting a fresh remake of The Fly ... only they're not exactly sure what it is they want to re-make. Do they want to head back to the source and "re-imagine" the short story by George Langelaan? Maybe they'd like a "re-do" on Kurt Neumann's 1958 adaptation or (perish the thought) David Cronenberg's 1986 remake? Heck, there's even a bunch of lame-duck sequels (Return of the Fly ('59), Curse of the Fly ('65), The Fly 2 ('89)) that are perfectly worthy of cannibalization.

One man who's probably not all that interested anymore is newcomer Todd Lincoln, a guy who's currently banging out a flick called Hack/Slash for Focus -- and who also (along with his partner, Martin Schenk) penned the first screenplay for Searchlight's impending Fly retread. Over at Fangoria, Mr. Lincoln somewhat immodestly describes his script as "a dark, smooth mixture of Val Lewton, Don Siegel and Roman Polanski," before explaining that the plan was to do a new take on Langelaan's original story. No fly head on a man's body, no telepods, no Brundlefly. The guy's screenplay actually sounded pretty cool ... but wouldn't you know it? "Last I heard, the people behind the people at the studio had changed their minds again and are leaning toward a straightforward remake," says Lincoln.

As for me, I say scrap the whole project. Then again, I'm speaking from the perspective of a passionate horror fan, and not of a studio executive who believes "horror remake" is synonomous with "easy money."