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Matt Reeves to Direct Post-Apocalyptic Vampire Movie The Passage

Looks like Fox 2000 has finally made some progress on their would-be adaptation of Justin Cronin’s mega post-apocalyptic vampire tome “The Passage”, setting “Let Me In’s” Matt Reeves to direct. The book first surfaced as a possible Ridley Scott movie way back in 2007, but like 99% of everything Scott attaches himself to, he won’t be directing “The Passage”, but will still produce via his Scott Free shingle.

The novel is set a hundred years in the future, where a government experiment to lengthen the human life span goes awry, unleashing a virus that physically and psychologically transforms people into vampires.

Basically, “28 Days Later” with vampires. It sounds mighty post-apocalyptic, to be sure. Reeves, by the way, is one busy fellow. He recently signed on to adapt Ray Nelson’s “8 O’Clock in the Morning”, aka the “They Live” remake that isn’t a remake of “They Live”, or so they insist. Reeves is supposed to write and direct “O’Clock”, but it looks like he will probably get to work on “The Passage” first, since the movie has had a script by former “Gladiator” scribe John Logan since 2009, though apparently Reeves will re-write the script with a new writer.

I actually have the huge 750-plus page hardcover version of the novel on my shelf, but ended up bailing on the book around page 30. It’s mighty ponderous. And slow. And dull. I might get back to it eventually, as soon as I finish Guillermo Del Toro’s “The Strain” and “The Fall”, the first two volumes of his and co-writer Chuck Hogan’s vampire trilogy. Maybe.

the passage