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Juan Carlos Fresnadillo Remaking Roger Corman's X

by Alex Billington
March 11, 2009

Spanish director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, best known as the guy who directed 28 Weeks Later, has been hired by MGM to develop a remake of Roger Corman's 1963 horror film X: The Man With the X-Ray Eyes. The original starred Ray Milland as a scientist who is close to achieving a breakthrough in x-ray vision technology when his funding is cut off. Desperate to show results, the doc applies the eye drops to himself eventually loses control over his growing powers. It's not exactly one of Corman's greats, but it is certainly one of his classics, and I'm actually very excited to see Fresnadillo rework for modern times.

Of course, the first recent horror movie about eyes that comes to mind is Jessica Alba's The Eye, but I don't think this will be anything like that. The Eye was a remake of a Chinese horror movie, not a Roger Corman classic. Fresnadillo is searching for a writer for this new project, and will develop it and direct it when ready. Fresnadillo had directed a film called Intacto before 28 Weeks Later, but he hasn't taken any jobs since that came out in May of 2007. It'll be good to see him return because I actually think he has a distinct style that worked well in 28 Weeks Later and I'm interested in seeing him continue to develop his directing.

Filed under Movie News, Opinions

From around the web:

Tom W

this seems like a pretty good idea and with movie technology today it could look really cool
Darrin

why do they keep doin remakes. do something original.
Mathieu

Well, look on the bright side; at least this makes a change from them remaking movies that only came out a couple of years ago! Fresnadillo is a fine director, so it's good to see him making a new movie. Just a shame it isn't something original. I guess he's got bills to pay like the rest of us...
http://movieguyreviews4u.blogspot.com Ryan

As long as they don't make it overly serious, count me in.
PJ

@ 2 you took the words right out of my mouth
ross

Intacto is an amazing film, this should be interesting.
Nick Sears

I agree, you need AT LEAST 10-20 years to do a remake/reboot/rewhatever. If its any earlier(or if its from a classic movie), it seems like a lame attempt to make money.
wm

#2 and #5. Come on, have you seen this movie? It's cool, but we all know this could be a nice remake. This is what they should be remaking, all these old b and z movies.
zubzwank

If you actually see the original, it's very existential, perhaps inadvertently. Roger Corman, appropriately, didn't usually get into philosophy and metaphysics in his early 60's flicks, but this one is different. It's sorta like the philosophizing at the end of The Incredible Shrinking Man, but darker. A well-written remake could be pretty cool. The guy could also see weird horrorific dimensions as a side effect of his new found abilities. Let's see it. Anything but more pretty vampires.
lumière

i'm amazed that anyone working in hollywood today has heard of a film made before 1970. a great original - sometimes cheesy and tacky, occasionally embarrassing and defiantly low budget - but entertaining. let's see if the remake can actually be entertaining. SPOILER - for the original Legend has it at the original ending, after the guy pulls his own eyes out in the church, he cried out 'i can still SEE!!' it was cut for being too (1950s) horrific. top that for a horror ending.