Like any other example of the undead, the Castlevania movie refuses to die properly. Though the WGA strike seems to have been the stake in the heart of Paul W.S. Anderson’s version, more than likely it’ll rise again. Or, worse, printed copies of the Anderson scriptment might be burned, the fumes rising to pollute the clouds before raining back down into a horde of similar projects.
That’s one way to explain Hotel Transylvania, which the Hollywood Reporter says Open Season director Jill Culton will helm for Sony Pictures Animation. Kevin and Daniel Hagerman are scripting the tale, about what happens when “Simon Van Helsing — the youngest in a long line of monster hunters — falls in love with Dracula’s daughter. Upon the discovery that they are enemies, the couple attempt to bring peace between the monsters and humans.“
If the title sounds familiar, it should. Sony’s been kicking it around for quite a while with a variety of directors/writer combos. The last had David Feiss and Anthony Stacchi directing from a Don Rhymer script.
The scrapped script was about “a group of classic monsters including Frankenstein, the Mummy, Dracula and the Werewolf who are hiding out in a hotel on the outskirts of Transylvania now that 21st century technology has seemingly made them irrelevant.”
That one, if not exactly a showstopper, (and definitely in Universal’s territory) sounds more interesting and would have been worth making if only to see if Surf’s Up really represented a change from previous Rhymer stuff like the two Big Momma’s House films and The Hooneymooners. I wouldn’t put huge faith in this version until we see actual footage. Sony doesn’t seem to have any executive consensus about what movie should be attached to this title, so it could all change again. Maybe they could just sell the property and let it go straight to the Nintendo DS.