Over 20 years after Uwe Boll turned the video game The House of the Dead into a horror movie, Deadline reports that Paul W.S Anderson (Event Horizon, Alien vs. Predator, Resident Evil film franchise, Monster Hunter) is making a House of the Dead movie of his own.
Paul W.S Anderson will write and direct the new adaptation of SEGA’s zombie game, which debuted back in 1997 and spawned a franchise as well as a remake in 2022. That original game, along with Resident Evil, is credited for kickstarting the zombie resurgence of the time.
Deadline recaps, “In the arcade game, players take on the role of AMS agents, a government agency tasked with thwarting the conspiracies of organizations that threaten the world. The title comes from the bureau they work for, because their life expectancies are brief.”
“I’ve loved the video game since the nineties,” Anderson tells Deadline. “Back then I was a big player of video games in arcades, which is how I happened upon Mortal Kombat. And pretty much at the same time, I was also playing a lot of House of the Dead. It’s a title I’ve always loved. The IP has grown in strength, and now it’s really cross-generational. I was one of the original players, but now I have teenage kids who also play. That is the real attraction for me, that you’ve got a cross-generational piece of IP.”
He continues, “We’re going to base the movie on House of the Dead 3, and if you know the mythology that is all about family conflict, amidst the action and scares. It’s about a woman, Lisa Rogan, who’s attempting to rescue her father. And it’s also about Daniel Curien, who’s the son of the man who caused this mutant outbreak in the first place and who has to deal with the sins of the father. My approach will be to reflect what this hyper-immersive, kinetic video game is, which is why Zack Snyder took these creatures and made them fast moving.”
“This is a full-on terror ride. It’s different than what we did with Resident Evil, where there were lots of traps and puzzles and things to be figured out,” Anderson adds.
Deadline’s exclusive report for Halloween notes that the team is looking to begin production on The House of the Dead sometime in mid-to-late 2025, and they’ve shared some early concept art (above and below). See more and learn more by checking out Deadline’s full report.
Credit: Original Game ©SEGA. ©SEGA/Herne Hill Media