Abe Lincoln: Vampire Hunter to be adapted by Tim Burton and Timur Bekmambetov

Tim Burton and Timur Bekmambetov (Wanted, Night Watch) are joing forces to bring the Seth Grahame-Smith novel Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter to the big screen.

I posted the trailer for the book yesterday and, according to Heat Vision, this caught the interest of Timur and Tim.

The book was released today by Grand Central Publishing.

Burton and Bekmambetov will produce the adaptation with Jim Lemley.

Grahame-Smith, who combined zombies and Jane Austen in the best-selling novel “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies,” will write the screenplay. The Zombies book is set up at Lionsgate with Natalie Portman producing and attached to direct.

If it does get as far as a film who should star in it and would you want Timur or Tim to direct or someone else?

The facts included are: for over 250 years, between 1607 and 1865, vampires thrived in the shadows of America. Few humans believed in them; Abraham Lincoln was the most gifted vampire hunter of his day, and kept a secret journal about his war against them; and rumors of the journal’s existence have long been a favorite topic among historians and Lincoln biographers. Most dismiss it as myth. Through the extraordinary discovery of Abraham Lincoln’s previously unknown and long lost journals, Seth Grahame-Smith brings to life the Great Emancipator’s untold history- his lifelong pursuit of the immortal undead. With unparalleled daring, Seth re-writes Abraham Lincoln’s biography to include this significant and gory piece of US history. “Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter” features all the detail, colour, and readability of Team of Rivals – Barack Obama’s favourite book and the number one bestselling Lincoln biography – with only some of the historical accuracy (and thrilling new scenes of vampire combat). From Lincoln’s frontier childhood to his assassination, this richly re-imagined history gives new meaning to the moments of an already incredible life.

Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter at Amazon.co.uk
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter at Amazon.com

Best Buds – Natalie Portman to star in stoner comedy

You may or may not know it but Natalie Portman has a production company called Handsome Charlie Films. She set it up to make films that she is interested in and so far that includes Hesher (starring Joseph Gordon Levitt) and it is currently setting up Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

Now, according to Pajiba Portman has got a female stoner comedy called Best Buds lined up after Thor. She will produce and star in the film which follows two best female friends who take a road trip to their friend’s wedding in order to save her by bringing her weed.

It is being likened to Harold and Kumar and Half-Baked (the latter of which is a brill comedy and if you haven’t seen it go and do it now).

Still early days on this one, but it does sound promising and who doesn’t like a good stoner comedy.

Gone With The Wind with Vampires

In the same vein as the books “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” and “Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters”, comes “Gone with the Wind with Vampires”, an alternate reality version of the beloved Southern epic. The film tells the story of Scarlett O’ Hara, one of the last surviving human beings, who is caught in the midst of a great vampire civil war. Marvel as she outwits the forces of the undead, while she flirts with her true bloo… er… love. Complete with heartaches and staked hearts, “Gone with the Wind with Vampires” will ‘blow’ you away.

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

Abe Lincoln – he’s been a President, starred in Bill and Ted’s history project and many other things. Now, in this new novel by Seth Grahame-Smith (Pride & Prejudice & Zombies) chronicles his time as a Vampire Hunter. Looks like it could be a fun read.

The facts included are: for over 250 years, between 1607 and 1865, vampires thrived in the shadows of America. Few humans believed in them; Abraham Lincoln was the most gifted vampire hunter of his day, and kept a secret journal about his war against them; and rumors of the journal’s existence have long been a favorite topic among historians and Lincoln biographers. Most dismiss it as myth. Through the extraordinary discovery of Abraham Lincoln’s previously unknown and long lost journals, Seth Grahame-Smith brings to life the Great Emancipator’s untold history- his lifelong pursuit of the immortal undead. With unparalleled daring, Seth re-writes Abraham Lincoln’s biography to include this significant and gory piece of US history. “Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter” features all the detail, colour, and readability of Team of Rivals – Barack Obama’s favourite book and the number one bestselling Lincoln biography – with only some of the historical accuracy (and thrilling new scenes of vampire combat). From Lincoln’s frontier childhood to his assassination, this richly re-imagined history gives new meaning to the moments of an already incredible life.

Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter at Amazon.co.uk
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter at Amazon.com

Hollywood wants Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

I mentioned this book back in January, but now it looks as if Hollywood have caught on and want in on the zombie classic mashup that started with Ryan Denmark’s Romeo and Juliet vs The Living Dead.

The Times have more on the whole thing.

This weekend Seth Grahame-Smith, the author of P&P&Z who is based in Los Angeles, revealed how he and an editor at Quirk Books, an independent publisher, developed a diagram tracing connections between seminal period novels to cult movie genres, including robots, vampires and aliens.

“It quickly became obvious that Jane [Austen] had laid down the blueprint for a zombie novel,” said Grahame-Smith, a television comedy writer. “Why else in the original should a regiment arrive on Lizzie Bennet’s doorstep when they should have been off fighting Napoleon? It was to protect the family from an invasion of brain-eaters, obviously.”

From then on it was easy to imagine Bennet and her four sisters as zombie slayers, trained since childhood in the deadly arts of Chinese kung fu, and Fitzwilliam Darcy as a promoter of the socially superior ninja skills of Japan. Together they stand bonnet to epaulette against a plague of cannibalis-tic interlopers from the accursed city of London.

Other talent agencies are pitching their own slate of monster-lit titles. They include a version of Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, where Catherine, the deceased heroine, returns as a Japanese-style ghost not only to haunt but also to terrorise Heathcliff.

In a reworking of Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre , M r Rochester has something more terrible than an insane spouse in his attic, and a version of George Eliot’s The Mill on the Floss is powered by human sacrifice.

What do you reckon? Who would you like to see play Darcy and Elizabeth Bennett in this version of Pride and Prejudice? Do you feel that classic literature should be mashed up with the horror film genre? How would you mash up some of the other classics?

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Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

First we had Romeo & Juliet vs The Living Dead now we have Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Rich sent me the link.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies features the original text of Jane Austen’s beloved novel with all-new scenes of bone-crunching zombie action. As our story opens, a mysterious plague has fallen upon the quiet English village of Meryton—and the dead are returning to life! Feisty heroine Elizabeth Bennet is determined to wipe out the zombie menace, but she’s soon distracted by the arrival of the haughty and arrogant Mr. Darcy. What ensues is a delightful comedy of manners with plenty of civilized sparring between the two young lovers—and even more violent sparring on the blood-soaked battlefield as Elizabeth wages war against hordes of flesh-eating undead. Complete with 20 illustrations in the style of C. E. Brock (the original illustrator of Pride and Prejudice), this insanely funny expanded edition will introduce Jane Austen’s classic novel to new legions of fans.
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