Jonathan Levine to Direct Warm Bodies aka “Twilight Meets Shaun of the Dead”
Zombies, zombies, and more zombies… studio execs in Hollywood seem only to have eyes for the undead as of late. Isaac Marion is the latest writer to stumble into fame after coming up with another minor variation on the zombie theme. After self-publishing his book Warm Bodies and selling it online, it was picked up for publication this year by Atria Books, a division of Simon and Schuster. Now his book is also being turned into a movie by Summit Entertainment with writer/director Jonathan Levine (The Wackness, All the Boys Love Mandy Lane) on board to adapt it.
Described as Twilight meets Shaun of the Dead, the story follows a zombie named “R” who falls in love with the human girlfriend of one of his victims. It supposedly has a bit of a Romeo & Juliet vibe to it, and brings to mind two other recently optioned rom-zom-coms: Breathers: A Zombie’s Lament, which is being produced by Diablo Cody, and Pride & Prejudice & Zombies, starring Natalie Portman and potentially being directed by David O. Russell. I think a lot of people have been feeling burnt out on zombies for a while now, but brace yourselves… the “teen-ification” of the genre is already underway. Still, who knows, maybe some of these books are actually decent and worthy of adaptation. Check out the short story, I Am A Zombie Filled With Love, which was the inspiration for Warm Bodies and see what you think.
Comments (5)
Haha, when you alluded to a ‘Romeo & Juliet vibe’, I read it initially as ‘Romero and Juliet’.
Posted by Booma on January 19th, 2010i just read the short story…nothing special.
Posted by Mike on January 19th, 2010i wonder how zombies get it on mmmmm….. fingers crossed for a sex scene
Posted by juan on January 20th, 2010sounds awful. making vampires fall in love with humans kinda makes sense, since the vampire myth always involves elements of lust and sexual undertones anyway. zombies are a different species basically, this storyline just doesn’t make sense to me
Posted by AlexG on January 20th, 2010The book was fantastic. The short story didnt do it any justice at all, the short story didnt go anywhere. I’d recommend it to anyone. Its better than Twilight in my opinion. And yes there was a sex scene of sorts hahaha
Posted by Brendan on February 24th, 2011Leave a Reply