At the Mountains of Madness no Longer going Ahead

The Scifi Channel Australia was reporting that Del Toro is no longer to do the much anticipated “At the Mountains of Madness” and had this to say:

In yet another gut-blow to fans of Pan’s Labyrinth and Hellboy director, Guillermo Del Toro, the Mexican filmmaker has announced that he won’t be directing the much anticipated HP Lovecraft epic, ‘At the Mountains of Madness’.

The film was to produced with the help of James Cameron in 3-D, and was to have a budget of around $US 150M.

Sadly, Del Toro has revealed to the world that “Madness has gone dark. The ‘R’ did us in.

The film was to be a big budget, classy take on a mind-bending horror story set in Antarctica. Think Indiana Jones, but on acid, in the cold, with monsters from another planet, exploring a forbidden city lost in the mountains of the world’s most isolated continent.

The film was ready to go, however, the problem cropped up when the required funding for the film came up against the barrier of the film’s content.

Whilst the film wasn’t going to be particularly gory, it was going to be “really, really uncomfortable and nasty”. In the US, that means that the film would more than likely garner an R certificate, slashing the possible viewership to those above the age of 17, unless accompanied by an adult.

Universal, the studio that was backing the film, baulked at the idea of spending $US 150 M on a film that wasn’t Batman.

This news came in the day after Tom Cruise had agreed to star in the film.

Fingers crossed that somehow the film can be made and get to be seen. This has long been described by Del Toro as his dream project, and after he had to relinquish control of The Hobbit films due to production delays, it would be a shame for the world to miss out on his unique vision up on the silver screen.

Here’s what he said about the transition from The Hobbit to At The Mountains of Madness:

“I came out of The Hobbit, and it was the biggest heartbreak I’ve experienced as a filmmaker, because I will never know what that movie would have been. I was very mindful that I didn’t want to have a rebound movie, as happens sometimes when somebody comes off a long romance. There were very big, lucrative, beautiful projects on the table, and I was developing one of them with Jim Cameron. In my stubborn fashion, I slipped Jim the script, again, when we were meeting on that other project. He said, you still want to do that? To his credit, he said, well, let’s pursue that instead. This is the movie I most want to do. I haven’t done horror in a long time.”

From there Bleeding Cool has came through with this:

Refusing to take “We’re scared and we don’t want to lose our money” for an answer, some plucky Guillermo Del Toro fans have set up an online petition titled Greenlight Mountains of Madness. Here’s what you’d be putting your virtual signature to:

Dear Universal Studios,

“At The Mountains of Madness” scares you. You fear the risk in funding such a movie. You fear the film will not bring in enough profit, when in fact a fresh film like this is exactly what the industry needs. This film will take the horror genre to new places. This is your chance to be credited as a modern day pioneer studio. This is your chance to be the studio willing to take the risk and make something original in a time of uninspired remakes and reboots. Fearing the outcome of a risky venture is understandable, but risks are unavoidable. This petition should ease your fears of the outcome somewhat, as everyone signing it is doing so as a promise to see this movie in theaters. Yes, we are asking you to take us on our word. We want to show you just how much this movie is needed. We want you to make “At The Mountains of Madness”. We want it to scare us.

Sincerely,
The Undersigned

I really hope we get to see this moving as Lovecraft has been deserving something more than the D Grade pathetic attempts to bastardize H.P. Lovecraft’s great work…

And who better to weave the story than Del Toro?

I’ve signed the petition so even though I’m not going to hold my breath I want to see this made.

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