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[Exclusive] Alex Kurtzman Says ‘The Invisible Man’ Will Stay True as a Scary, Humorous Madman

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Written by Patti Pauley

Universal is kicking off the highly anticipated first installment of it’s Dark Universe this week with The Mummy starring an artifact thieving Tom Cruise up against the horrifyingly beautiful Sophia Boutella as Princess Ahmanet that will eventually bring all the beloved Universal Monsters together to a full circle with a string of films intertwining with each other. In previous reports, Russell Crowe’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde persona, who makes his first strong appearance in The Mummy, serves as a window into this newly formed Dark Universe that includes Frankenstein, the Bride, and the Invisible Man in future films with newly announced plans for Phantom of the Opera and Hunchback of Notre Dame to be included in the future.

In a press conference call earlier today with iHorror on one side of the horn with director Alex Kurtzman, the enthusiastic horror fan at heart explained more in detail Crowe’s character development for the unraveling franchise to come:

“There was a lot of conversation and debate early on about bringing Henry Jekyll into a Mummy movie; in terms of the film, we were constantly asking ourselves ‘How do we deliver something new to the table?’ And what we wanted to do was give you a satisfying Mummy movie experience on its own terms and to open the door to the Dark Universe by planting seeds without having an overwhelming narrative. We thought this was the way to go. What we don’t want to do is smash characters together just to have them together. Part of the storytelling here is that The Mummy exists in a larger world of Gods and Monsters, and it became very clear we needed an element to help understand that. Dr. Jekyll served a guide for Nick (Tom Cruise) in The Mummy in the monster-verse and will be back in many of the Monster films.”

 

When prompted about the upcoming chapter in Dark Universe The Invisible Man that has already cast Johnny Depp as the, what I like to call, Freddy Krueger of the Universal Monsters series with his dark humor and memorable one-liners, and if the studios intend to keep him just that way, The Mummy director and executive producer of The Invisible Man assured us exclusively this dark and scary character will keep his humorous wit about him:

“I think horror and humor work so well together and with Johnny, some of my favorite work with him is when he jumps back and forth between being very funny and also very dark. He does it so uniquely well. With the Invisible Man in particular, he’s actually such a scary character. As much as there’s humor in it, he’s essentially a scientist who has gone mad with his experiments and wants to use this newly found power, to do very destructive and terrible things. We ask ourselves, why do people love these Universal Monsters and what is it about them people embrace so much? We want to make sure we’re protecting that and not trying to reinvent to the degree that it feels like we’re betraying the audience and characters. Humor, drama, and horror work all very well together and we want to see Johnny do all of the above.”

 

Claude Rains agrees Mr. Kurtzman.

invisible man-johnny depp

The Mummy opens nationwide June, 9 2017.

Featured image credit: 411Mania

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‘Evil Dead’ Film Franchise Getting TWO New Installments

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It was a risk for Fede Alvarez to reboot Sam Raimi’s horror classic The Evil Dead in 2013, but that risk paid off and so did its spiritual sequel Evil Dead Rise in 2023. Now Deadline is reporting that the series is getting, not one, but two fresh entries.

We already knew about the Sébastien Vaniček upcoming film that delves into the Deadite universe and should be a proper sequel to the latest film, but we are broadsided that Francis Galluppi and Ghost House Pictures are doing a one-off project set in Raimi’s universe based off of an idea that Galluppi pitched to Raimi himself. That concept is being kept under wraps.

Evil Dead Rise

“Francis Galluppi is a storyteller who knows when to keep us waiting in simmering tension and when to hit us with explosive violence,” Raimi told Deadline. “He is a director that shows uncommon control in his feature debut.”

That feature is titled The Last Stop In Yuma County which will release theatrically in the United States on May 4. It follows a traveling salesman, “stranded at a rural Arizona rest stop,” and “is thrust into a dire hostage situation by the arrival of two bank robbers with no qualms about using cruelty-or cold, hard steel-to protect their bloodstained fortune.”

Galluppi is an award-winning sci-fi/horror shorts director whose acclaimed works include High Desert Hell and The Gemini Project. You can view the full edit of High Desert Hell and the teaser for Gemini below:

High Desert Hell
The Gemini Project

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‘Invisible Man 2’ Is “Closer Than Its Ever Been” to Happening

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Elisabeth Moss in a very well-thought-out statement said in an interview for Happy Sad Confused that even though there have been some logistical issues for doing Invisible Man 2 there is hope on the horizon.

Podcast host Josh Horowitz asked about the follow-up and if Moss and director Leigh Whannell were any closer to cracking a solution to getting it made. “We are closer than we have ever been to cracking it,” said Moss with a huge grin. You can see her reaction at the 35:52 mark in the below video.

Happy Sad Confused

Whannell is currently in New Zealand filming another monster movie for Universal, Wolf Man, which might be the spark that ignites Universal’s troubled Dark Universe concept which hasn’t gained any momentum since Tom Cruise’s failed attempt at resurrecting The Mummy.

Also, in the podcast video, Moss says she is not in the Wolf Man film so any speculation that it’s a crossover project is left in the air.

Meanwhile, Universal Studios is in the middle of constructing a year-round haunt house in Las Vegas which will showcase some of their classic cinematic monsters. Depending on attendance, this could be the boost the studio needs to get audiences interested in their creature IPs once more and to get more films made based on them.

The Las Vegas project is set to open in 2025, coinciding with their new proper theme park in Orlando called Epic Universe.

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Jake Gyllenhaal’s Thriller ‘Presumed Innocent’ Series Gets Early Release Date

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Jake gyllenhaal presumed innocent

Jake Gyllenhaal’s limited series Presumed Innocent is dropping on AppleTV+ on June 12 instead of June 14 as originally planned. The star, whose Road House reboot has brought mixed reviews on Amazon Prime, is embracing the small screen for the first time since his appearance on Homicide: Life on the Street in 1994.

Jake Gyllenhaal’s in ‘Presumed Innocent’

Presumed Innocent is being produced by David E. Kelley, J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot, and Warner Bros. It is an adaptation of Scott Turow’s 1990 film in which Harrison Ford plays a lawyer doing double duty as an investigator looking for the murderer of his colleague.

These types of sexy thrillers were popular in the ’90s and usually contained twist endings. Here’s the trailer for the original:

According to Deadline, Presumed Innocent doesn’t stray far from the source material: “…the Presumed Innocent series will explore obsession, sex, politics and the power and limits of love as the accused fights to hold his family and marriage together.”

Up next for Gyllenhaal is the Guy Ritchie action movie titled In the Grey scheduled for release in January 2025.

Presumed Innocent is an eight-episode limited series set to stream on AppleTV+ starting June 12.

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