Just in case you needed further proof that Hollywood originality had gone the way of the Dodo, western and Hayden Christensen, it's been announced that the 1988 horror Pumpkinhead is the latest franchise to get the reboot treatment. Peter Block, the executive producer of the Saw franchise, is the one now aiming to bring Pumpkinhead to a modern audience.
Entertainment Weekly confirmed that Peter Block has picked up the rights to Pumpkinhead and its disappointing sequels, which included the 1994 straight to video follow-up Pumpinhead II: Blood Wings, and the made for TV movies Pumpkinhead: Ashes To Ashes and Pumpkinhead: Blood Feud, both of which were shown on Syfy in October, 2006 and October, 2007, respectively.
The original 1988 film is now a bona-fide cult horror classic, though mostly because it was the directorial debut of Stan Winston -- the special and visual effects guru who won Academy Awards for his work on Aliens and Jurassic Park. He even bagged two for Visual Effects & Best Makeup on Terminator 2: Judgment Day, but his work went way beyond such accolades and truly redefined cinema.
In Pumpkinhead, Lance Henriksen (Aliens, Near Dark) took the lead role of Ed Harley, who is consumed by grief after the death of his young son by a group of teenagers. After visiting an alleged witch, who can't bring back his son back to life, Harley insists that he'll do anything for revenge. Upon her orders, Harley digs up a decrepit corpse from an old graveyard and brings it to the witch, who then uses blood from the father and son to resurrect the corpse. The body instantly evolves into a humungous, disgusting monster named Pumpkinhead. From there on out, things get increasingly bad for the teenagers responsible.
Peter Block is already hard at work on the Pumpkinhead reboot, as it has been reported that he wants the reboot to start shooting at some point in 2017, while its theatrical release would then follow soon after. The producer has yet to land on the right director to help him in this quest, but alongside writer Nate Atkins, Block has already developed the script, and is insistent that they'll use practical effects to mirror its predecessor and Stan Winston.
Clearly a huge fan of the original, Block told Entertainment Weekly Stan that while Winston sits "on that Mount Rushmore of iconic filmmakers because of his creature designs" the reboot will expand the character, and enhance the setting "to give it a different kind of experience." Block made sure to insist that the themes, story, shots, and lines of Stan Winston's Pumpkinhead will be included, though, as he attempts to rejuvenate the dormant franchise after its sequels failed to build upon the original.
