| Author | Message | ||
     Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.156.210.82 |
http://www.fangoria.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=6389%3Afang oria-partners-on-ramsey-campbells-nazareth-hill-movie&catid=1%3Alatest-news&Item id=167 | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
Awesome! | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
This is fantastic news! I'm forever bemoaning the dearth of film adaptations of Ramsey's work as I've always found him a highly cinematic writer. Great horror/suspense thrillers like 'The Face That Must Die' or 'The Last Voice They Hear', in particular, cry out to be filmed. 'The House On Nazareth Hill' could be turned into a cracking haunted house/possession movie along the lines of 'The Shining' but it'll take one hell of a talented director and quality casting in the lead roles of the father and daughter (any suggestions, people?) to make it work the way the novel does - as so much more than another haunted house frightener. Of all Ramsey's novels I found it one of the most psychologically punishing and it would be nice to see that reflected in the film version. 'Insidious' it isn't... One final thought. The original title is much stronger - screaming out HORROR - than just plain 'Nazareth Hill' which could just as well be a teenage soap opera, imo. | ||
| Matthew Fryer (Matthew_fryer) Username: Matthew_fryer Registered: 08-2009 Posted From: 94.12.171.50 |
Agree about the title. And also, it's the house that's the important element, not just the hill. I really hope they do it justice. One of my favourite Ramsey novels, and a genuinely terrifying transformation. Off the top of my head, I could see Dominic West or John Simm as the dad. Dunno about the daughter. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.23.40.152 |
John Simm a bit young? | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.29.252.215 |
Peter Mullan would be perfect for the role - playing the same kind of tyrannical father, thinking he knows best, he played in 'NEDS' (with religious mania replacing the alcoholism). Some up-and-coming young actress, with attitude and pesonality over cute good looks, would be needed for the daughter - rather than some Hollywood starlet type. | ||
| Matt_cowan (Matt_cowan) Username: Matt_cowan Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 68.58.73.80 |
I'd love to see it! Hope it all works out. | ||
| Matthew Fryer (Matthew_fryer) Username: Matthew_fryer Registered: 08-2009 Posted From: 94.12.171.50 |
John Simm probably is too young, actually. I just think he has a barely-tapped darkness that needs a role like that. Peter Mullan would be good. I could see also see Christopher Eccleston or Robert Carlyle. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.23.40.152 |
I always imagined the father in NH to be in his fifties, for some reason. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 2.24.39.72 |
This is most encouraging. The film has the potential to be highly effective: a serious ghost story that doesn't pull punches, but engages the audience's intelligence. It's thanks to the success of films like The Orphanage and Dark Water that this adaptation is a real commercial prospect. Like The Influence and The Darkest Part of the Woods, though very different from either, The House on Nazareth Hill deals with the malign hold of the past over the present. The 'possession' is something laying claim to what it regards as its rightful inheritance. It's not the abnormal, the outsider, that returns to cause harm but the spectre of the brutally normative, the monster of religious and moral authority. The challenge for the film adaptation is to capture the novel's historical and mythic undertones, not just dramatise the real-time portrait of religious mania. | ||
| Simon Bestwick (Simon_b) Username: Simon_b Registered: 10-2008 Posted From: 86.24.166.73 |
This is actually one of my favourite Ramsey novels. Or so I recall. I read a library copy first, then bought one (with the typo on the last page amended by the landlord himself!) That copy is still on my shelf, unread, because I found the single time I read the book so harrowing and distressing I still haven't nerved myself to go through it again. This, I should add, is a good thing as far as I'm concerned.  It'd make a great film, if they can get it right. Some interesting suggestions about casting... I could imagine Christopher Eccleston being quite terrifying in the part, with his usual intensity. Or maybe Gary Oldman. Or is he too old? | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.148.240.248 |
"Born in Liverpool in 1964, Campbell has been writing since the 1960s." ????????????????????????? Did you start writing when you were younger than 6? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.23.40.152 |
Ramsey was born in 1946. Typo. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.148.240.248 |
I know | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.29.252.215 |
One thing I can see the filmmakers having potential problems with is the unremitting bleakness of the novel. What that girl goes through is beyond horrendous and I too found the book almost too distressingly effective to be considered wholly "enjoyable". It's a real kick in the balls of a novel so I won't be at all surprised if they feel duty bound to mellow things down for a cinema audience... let's hope not, eh. |