ScottBSmith Tagged Articles at Cinematical

The Ruins opened on Friday like most horror films, with a single, late Thursday night "promo" screening, to which the press was gamely invited in full knowledge that it would be too late for review, even for any reasonable web deadline. What's different about The Ruins is that it's not a remake or even a copy of any horror film of recent years. We're talking first-class material, adapted from a novel by Scott B. Smith, who wrote both the mesmerizing 1993 book A Simple Plan as well as Sam Raimi's masterful 1998 film of the same name. It's a terrific airplane novel, surprising and gripping, and Dreamworks could have made an outstanding film of it. But they threw it away, perhaps deliberately, hoping for some of that fast opening weekend green, and little caring about making something worthwhile or lasting (like A Simple Plan).

Like our own Scott Weinberg, I'm a fan of the Scott B. Smith novel that is the basis for the upcoming horror flick The Ruins, though I'm hoping the filmmakers cut out certain risible elements -- not the scenes that made me wince, but ones that were so stupid they made me want to throw the book across the room. As a whole, though, the book is very good in setting up a scenario that slowly morphs from perfectly ordinary to horrifying beyond belief.

Scott pointed to posters and a "red-band" trailer last month and now two new clips have been released. They're both available on the restricted portion of the official site, where you'll need to provide your name and date of birth to gain entry. If the trailer left horror fans wondering how far they would push things in the gore department, the clips -- especially the one titled "Get It Out" -- make it clear. They're blood-soaked, but more in the vein of excruciating rather than exploitative.

For a story like The Ruins, featuring a small group of characters dealing with a terrifying situation, it needs to be grounded in reality, and I'm hoping for the best. Carter Smith makes his directorial debut; the film stars Jonathan Tucker, Laura Ramsey, Shawn Ashmore and Jena Malone, all of whom look up to the task of screaming and grimacing, at least in the trailer and clips. The Ruins creeps into theaters on April 4.

[ Via Dread Central ]

One of the studio-based horror projects that I've got my eye on is The Ruins, which is based on a very fine novel by Scott B. Smith. If they hew closely enough to the source material, I'm thinking The Ruins could make for one ferociously memorable little terror flick -- but we'll have to wait until April 4 to find out.

Helmed by first-timer Carter Smith and starring folks like Jonathan Tucker, Laura Ramsey, Shawn Ashmore and Jena Malone, The Ruins tells the tale of an ill-fated trip into the jungle ... but it's NOT your typical hack 'n' slash affair. Trust me on that. Two new posters for the flick gives away a little bit of who/what the antagonist is, but not enough to ruin the fun. Check out that one-sheet right here at Shock, and then head on over to JoBlo's for a peek at the second poster. (Starting to sense a theme in these posters?)

The official site also has a new "red-band" trailer up, and it's even better than the "all ages" teaser that appeared a few weeks back. Ooh, and best of all: The Ruins has been rated R by the MPAA for "strong violence and graphic images," in addition to some other adult-oriented stuff. So to those who were worried that Smith's story would be toned down for a PG-13 crowd, feel free to offer some thanks to Paramount and DreamWorks.