News on the remake tip is becoming a near-daily occurrence at this point, so it comes as no surprise that three more overseas fright films are poised for American translation.
Two of the reduxes are being developed by Dimension Films, which is currently fielding writers for English-language versions of Takashi Miike’s MPD PSYCHO (MPD standing for “multiple personality detective”) and Ataru Oikawa’s TOMIE. Based on a manga property, the former title was originally brought to the screen as a TV miniseries and tells the story of a homicide detective who develops a multiple personality disorder following the death of his wife. This prompts him to avenge her death and find her killer—but a new series of bizarre slayings crops up, in which the suspects claim to be the slain murderer.
The original episodes made their way to the States on DVD from Adness Entertainment via Ventura—as did TOMIE, which jumpstarted a multipicture franchise in Japan. We can thank another manga, this one by veteran of the form Junji (UZAMAKI) Ito, for the sick premise behind this one, which focuses on a young woman named Tomie, an attractive gal whose various lovers ultimately kill her. Tomie, however, never dies and keeps coming back to haunt her suitors.
Elsewhere, Dark Castle is flirting with the idea of remaking the French “zombie” picture THEY CAME BACK (LES REVENANTS), Robin Campillo’s film that asks, “What would you do if your loved one returned from the grave?” Released at home in 2004 and issued on domestic disc last year by Wellspring, the film is heavy in the drama department and perplexed any horror fans who went in expecting standard flesheating-ghoul fare. This is yet another remake in the Dark Castle canon, joining its retread of I SAW WHAT YOU DID, a project currently in the scripting stage.
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