Landon Talks “Arachnophobia” Remake Rejection

“Happy Death Day” and “Drop” filmmaker Christopher Landon has told Vanity Fair (via The Playlist) that due to creative differences, Amblin Entertainment has decided to pass on his version of a remake of Frank Marshall’s 1990 horror-comedy “Arachnophobia”.

Both Marshall and Steven Spielberg have been trying to get a new version off the ground for a while with James Wan attached to an earlier version before Landon signed on a few years back. He tells the outlet:

“There was a component that the studio was very nervous about and uncomfortable with – and that’s where we parted. I wasn’t willing to compromise on that. I wasn’t going to make a change that really felt like a soul-crushing, sell-out, bad change.”

Speaking separately with The Wrap, he went into more detail about his take on the property which moved away from the more comedy leanings of the original film towards more of a body horror vibe.

He says it was only a remake in the sense of it being a spider invasion in a small town, this time one set in West Texas. In his take, the spiders had large enough fangs to slice into flesh and lay eggs inside the human victim’s body.

He adds: “It was brutal…There’s a spider invasion, and all hell breaks loose.” He wanted a Tim Allen-type for the role of an oil magnate trying to win a mayoral race, and had written in a return for John Goodman’s memorable exterminator character Delbert McClintock from the original.

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