It’s a little known fact that there’s remake of Dario Argento’s masterpiece, Suspiria (1977), in the works. It’s also stuck in development hell. Argento has reportedly given his blessing to the remake since the start, stating that, no remake would ever “overshadow” his “masterpiece.” However, the project is currently tangled up in legal and budgetary issues and in limbo.
David Gordon Green is currently set to director, and he has extensive plans for the film, but back when Dimension was attached to the Suspiria remake Mimi Leder (Deep Impact, The Peacemaker, Thick as Thieves) was tapped… then it was Luca Guadagnino (Diarchy, and a number of shorts and documentaries). An early candidate for the lead was Natalie Portman, but she opted to do Black Swan instead.
Green has stated that he intends to remain pretty faithful to the original film, but with his own flavor, an aim to avoid the current horror trends, and an unknown cast. When he saw the success of Black Swan, he was forced to reconsider his Suspiria remake project. Such changes included a shift from a ballet focus to “an all-girls boarding school” focus. Green went on to state:
“[Black Swan] did inspire me to think, ‘Well, I want to go younger now. I want this to be about 14-, 15-year-old girls, rather than women who are Natalie’s age.’ It made me not want to do what Black Swan kind of did with the psychology and thriller elements of older characters. If anything, I want to focus on the younger, more naïve kinds of characters—the wide-eyed, Snow White version of the movie, rather than a more sophisticated, sexual version of it.”
With filming that’s been changed and rescheduled since 2010, it’s hard to say for sure who the cast will include, but according to IMDB Pro, Janet McTeer (Waking the Dead, The Woman in Black) and Isabelle Fuhrman (Orphan, The Hunger Games)are confirmed, while Antje Traue (Pandorum, 5 Days of War, Nobel’s Last Will, Man of Steel, Seventh Son), Michael Nyqvist (London Voodoo, Next Door, Downloading Nancy, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Abduction), and Isabelle Huppert are rumored.
Isabelle Fuhrman
Just today, August 13, 2013, Green stated:
“I don’t know if it’ll ever happen. Someone needs to do something very artful with that project. I’m just excited at the thought of making something elegant, and graphic, and classy at a point in the horror genre where everybody’s making films raw, and found-footage. I want something to contrast that, but anybody that’s interested in horror movies has no interest in that right now. At least, not with my involvement. But maybe someone else will do it. I’ve got the whole movie in my head. It’s ready to go, but it just costs too much. My version of it costs too much.”
The Suspiria remake hasn’t been all turbulence though, Green did get the rights to use the Goblin score. However, he does have plans to change it up a bit.
Stay tuned to Yell! Magazine as news of the Susperia remake develops.
Rock Hard \m/
