The Old West, period horror, and Neil Marshall
 

March 11, 2008


Focus Features genre arm has made a deal for writer-director Neil Marshall's follow-up to Doomsday. Sacrilege is a horror film which is to be set in the Old West - an untapped environment loaded with possibilities.

Marshall pitched the project to Rogue topper Andrew Rona, and he will write and direct it.

"It is set during the Gold Rush, a time remembered for incidents like the Donner Party," Marshall said. "It is meant to be a pitch-black, gritty, period horror movie."

Marshall, who wrote and directed "Dog Soldiers" and "The Descent" as well as "Doomsday," grew up in England watching oaters and horror films in equal measure and dreamed of combining the genres. Marshall declined to disclose much detail on "Sacrilege," but the picture will draw on themes of isolation and paranoia and such influences as John Carpenter's "The Thing."

"This is 'Unforgiven' by way of H.P. Lovecraft, with that grim, gritty setting and a horror element nobody has seen before," Marshall said.

He added that he'd begin writing immediately.

"I've always got a few irons in the fire, but this has long been an ambition of mine," Marshall said.

ooooooooooooooooo,

very exciting.

It would be nice to see a GOOD horror/western movie.

This could be REALLY good. Definitely looking forward to this one. :)

This sounds very promising.
Neil Marshall is fast emerging as a good director, and he will definitely make this a good one.

As a devoted fan of both westerns and horror, I would love to see a good movie blending both genres and with Neil Marshall at the helm this could be very promising.

Honestly, Ive never really got into westerns that much. Ive seen plenty of them but could count on one hand how many Ive liked enough to watch twice.
This sounds like it could be pretty good though.

3:10 To Yuma, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, Unforgiven, The Wild Bunch, The Quick and the Dead, The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, Fistfull of Dollars, A Few Dollars More, High Plains Drifter... have you seen all of those? I can name more great ones! Although there have been PLENTY of bad westerns, and almost every horror/western is bad. I have high hopes for this project though, let's hope they're not dashed.

I fucking love westerns.

anyone know what happened with Miike's western? i heard abot it a while ago, then never again.

this should be awesome though. a mix of 2 of my favorite genres.

I love westerns too. Both Dog Soldiers and The Descent were really good (haven't seen Doomsday yet), so this will be something to look forward to.