The Leprechaun movies make up a very long line of fan favorite films getting the remake treatment. This new film will be called Leprechaun Origins and will be directed by Zach Lipovsky. If you are unaware of Mr Lipovsky’s work, and I am guessing most of you are, then here is a quote from Gamma Squad that gives us a bit of information about him.
[quote] Lipovsky has written and directed numerous short films and TV movies, and he also produced the upcoming found-footage action-thriller Ends of the Earth, which CBS Films will release in the U.S. and Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions, will distribute overseas. He’s currently developing a Canadian movie about the War of 1812 in the vein of “300.”[/quote]
So that all seems promising enough for someone I had never heard of before, but the director is not the real shock here. The shocking news is that it is the WWE (with Lionsgate) is in charge of the remake. The entity famous for wrestling has their own film production company, which makes sense when you think that wrestling itself is just a mix of soap operas, colorful costumes, and fighting. They don’t call it sports entertainment for nothing you know. Now the WWE stable of movies has more misses than it does hits. For every fun movie like The Marine, we have the hideous cinematic failures like Knucklehead and The Chaperone. In the company’s defense however, their foray into the horror genre, while mindless, was actually lots of fun, with the hulking wrestler Kane throwing people around like rag dolls in See No Evil. It at least kept your bum in its seat.
The problem with this latest installment however is casting. Take a look at the original Leprechaun played by the great Warwick Davis. He looks pretty cool right?
Now look at Hornswoggle the wrestler the WWE has put in as the lead character.
Granted, this won’t be the Leprechaun costume in the movie, but still, this guy is no Warwick Davis. In the WWE Hornswoggle is your goofy vertically challenged character that gets his ass kicked, but is supposed to be lovable. Can he pull of this new horror role? With Lionsgate wanting this new instalment to be darker in tone (like every other remake out there) we will have to wait and see if he has the acting chops to pull this off. My personal feeling is that no one is going to be able to pull off what Warwick Davis did in these movies. Sure they got really silly near the end but Warwick’s charm kept you watching.
But hey maybe I am wrong and Dylan Postl (the wrestler / actor playing Hornswoggle) just needs this change to break out and give us all a scare. The first movie was a pretty dark affair already, so it will be interesting to see how WWE is going to top that. The original had a young Jennifer Aniston being chased by a Leprechaun who planned to rape her while murdering everyone else. That is a tough act to follow, but this is the same company that introduced necrophilia into its wrestling plots. This could be either the funniest horror film this year or one of the worst turkeys imaginable, and with the WWE track record I am betting on the worst. If nothing else it will be interesting to see if it can make people forget about the Leprechaun’s trip into space…
Grizzly Bomb 