Carl Rinsch in Talks to Direct 'Creature From the Black Lagoon' Remake

It was reported back in May that Universal’s upcoming remake of the classic monster movie, "Creature from the Black Lagoon," had lost its director. Breck Eisner was rumored to be attached to the remake, but we learned thereafter that he didn't take the job

Variety now says that Universal Pictures is in early talks with Carl Erik Rinsch to direct the remake of the 1954 film about an undersea creature that terrorizes a scientific expedition.

Rinsch was originally a commercial film director and he was once rumored to to direct a prequel to “Alien,” until Ridley Scott decided to helm that film. If he gets this "Black Lagoon" job it would mark his second big collaboration with Universal after "47 Ronin," which Rinsch will make his feature film directing debut with.

“47 Ronin,” will star Keanu Reeves and is an epic period samurai swordsmen tale that takes place in 18th Century Japan. That picture is expected to begin production next year.

Universal has been keen to reprise “Creature” since it's one of its most famous monster franchises. Another reason would be to bring the classic film to a brand new audience who probably aren’t familiar with the original.

We can't tell if Rinsch is right for this film or not since he hasn't directed a movie yet, but you can catch some of his commercials HERE.

There’s no word on when "Creature from the Black Lagoon" will start shooting or hit theaters.

More news to come! Catch ya' later!
Sources: Screen Rant, Variety

Creature from Black Lagoon Remake Needs a New Director

Bloody-Disgusting learned that Breck Eisner - who is currently hard at work on Overture Films' remake of "The Crazies" and is scheduled to remake "Flash Gordon" - will in fact not be directing "The Creature from the Black Lagoon" remake for Universal Pictures and Strike Entertainment.

Oddly, back in April, Eisner spoke with Arrow in the Head about his plans for the remake without any indication that might be leaving, so we're not sure why he left.

The project is still being developed by Gary Ross, whose father wrote the original. "Creature" is about a group of scientists who discover and capture the prehistoric GillMan while searching for fossils along the Amazon River. The creature breaks free and kidnaps one of the scientists' fiancee with whom it has fallen in love. Universal and Strike Entertainment are now looking for a new director to replace Eisner.

Who do you think should direct this remake?
More news to come! Catch ya' later!

Director on Creature From Black Lagoon and Flash Gordon

JoBlo had the chance to interview director Breck Eisner while he was working on his current film, the remake of George Romero's 1973 chiller "The Crazies," about the progress of two other movies he is currently working on.

The remake of "The Creature of the Black Lagoon" and the remake of "Flash Gordon."

"I love them both, they're both big movies. I think I will push both of them forward at full pedal and hope one of them goes first."



On the status of "Flash Gordon": "We broke story with the writers [Matt] Sazama and [Burk] Sharpless for the last five or six months or so. They went to draft just as we started shooting, and they're going to get to me a draft at wrap. I'll read it and do notes and we'll do a polish on that and give it to the studio a couple months from now. Hopefully the studio will like it and we'll go forward. It's a big movie and the studio has got to love the script."

"The thing about 'Flash' is, you've got to throw away the 80s version of it. I want it to be intense, aggressive, gritty and real. For me it's about reinventing 'Flash' - we're still staying true to the adventure origins of it, and the adventurous spirit in that movie, absolutely. It's this man brought to another planet and uniting the disperate groups on Mongo, but there is a gritty, intense, dynamic, active quality to the movie. Very modern. It's not camp."



On his vision of "Creature of the Black Lagoon": "I want it to be scary. It's a bigger movie, so it's not an R rated scary, it's gonna be a PG-13 scary. 'Creature' takes you to a place you've never been before, it's one of the last untamed places on the edge of the Earth where you find this creature that has been living and hiding there forever, basically. It's definitely going for a dark adventure tone, but I want it to be scary."

Hope to hear more news on thiese films soon! Catch ya' later!

The Creature From the Black Lagoon

Breck Eisner spoke about his next film in an interview with ShockTilYouDrop (this was back in May!). The film in question is the remake of the classic 1954 film "Creature From the Black Lagoon."

"We scouted the movie last year but got shut down when the writers strike happened," Eisner explains to ShockTilYoudrop. "We had a crew in the Amazon where we're going to shoot all of the exteriors. We're shooting in Manaus, Brazil and on the Amazon in Peru. I want it to be authentic. I'm a big fan of Werner Herzog and Fitzcarraldo. Herzog got that authenticity. He shot in Manaus. So, we scouted for a month. There's this place called the Forest of Mirrors, because there are so many lagoons on a thousand mile green carpet river, and we found the lagoon we're going to shoot in."

The new Creature will take place in a contemporary setting, and, will feature a mixture of CG and practical FX. "The Creature has been designed, we've spent six months designing him." Eisner says Spectral Motion has built a maquette based on an appearance created by Mark "Crash" McCreery ("Jurassic Park," "Pirates of the Caribbean"). "We went top shelf on it. It's very faithful to the original, but updated."

Eisner was asked how the tone of the film would be. Would it be filled with action or will it be more of a horror film?

"We debated tone a thousand times. For me tone is the most interesting thing a filmmaker has and so the Creature is a creature, it's not a monster. That's my number one thing about the movie. We're not going to turn him into a monster. He's still going to be empathetic, he's still going to be deadly, he's still going to have a misguided means of expressing his interests in a woman, but it's uniquely the Creature. It's empathy for a deadly creature and tone plays a big part of that." Still, Eisner knows full well Universal is aiming for summer movie fare so, "it will deliver of action and excitement, but I want it to be scary. The Creature was scary when it first came out in '54 - it's not scary today - but that's what updating means to me, updating the tone of the original."

Latino Review got to sit down with the writer of the screenplay, Gary Ross, for the new film and got to talk more about the tone of it.

You're working Creature From The Black Lagoon?

Ross: Ya, I'm producing. And I wrote a script.

And how's that going?

Ross: It's going great. We're actually moving forward.

What's the tone of the film going to be?

Ross: it's not campy. It's not like the original, it's not, my Dad wrote the original, so it's not a reference to what the original is. We take it sort of seriously. We found some scientific under pinnings for it, which my Dad actually felt in the original. In fact, he based it on a lung fish that was found around that time. So a lot of that was his. And kind of the conflict between science and uh...

Will the tone be a throwback to some of the older...?

Ross: Actually, no. We're going to treat it with a certain amount of dignity. We're not approaching this a in a retro campy kind of way. it's set in present day. There are reasonable scientific under pinnings. It should really be an interesting journey into the jungle both for the characters and for the audience.

Do you think there should be a "Creature From the Black Lagoon" remake? If so, what would you like the tone of the new "Creature From the Black Lagoon" to be like?