Uwe Boll Unhappy With Paul W.S. Anderson’s ‘House of the Dead’, Launches Crowdfunding Campaign For ’23 Years Later: Return To Zombie Island’
Ever considering himself the most auteur of film directors, original House of the Dead film director Uwe Boll is unsurprisingly very unhappy with Sony’s decision to greenlight a new take on SEGA’s zombie franchise from Paul W.S. Anderson, as evidenced by his recent announcement that he intends to crowdfund his own unofficial reboot, 23 Years Later: Return to Zombie Island.
First unmasked on Halloween 2024 and recently confirmed to star Superman/DCU Hawkgirl actress Isabella Merced, the new House of the Dead film will, according to Anderson himself, lean heavily on not just the game’s original lore, but also its actual playtime experience.
“We’re going to base the movie on House of the Dead III, and if you know the mythology that is all about family conflict, amidst the action and scares,” the Resident Evil film series director told Deadline. “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. House of the Dead is at heart a light rail shooter game, so it drags you straight into the middle of the action.
“I’m going to make a movie that mirrors that approach and plays out in real time, dragging the audience straight into the action. It’s not going to be kind of lumbered with a whole bunch of back story that might exclude people who know nothing about House of the Dead. Everyone’s going to be on the same page. Everyone’s going to get sucked straight into the action and learn about the characters and the plot, as they have 90 minutes to basically escape the most extreme haunted house you’ve ever been in.”
Having a distaste for Anderson ever since 2005’s Phantom Thread, whose poster he accused of being a direct rip-off of the one used for his own Bloodrayne, Boll revealed his plans for 23 Years Later: Return to Zombie Island on the back of Merced’s aforementioned House of the Dead casting, the delivery platform of his choice being an admittedly cool, custom website reminiscent of those that dotted the internet in the early 2000s (replete with a simple, in-browser mini-game, Eat the Critics).
Explaining his mission to potential funders, Boll decried, “Now SONY is filming with Paul Anderson (yes…the very bad director…not the good one) a new HOUSE OF THE DEAD and it creates thanks to the US-$ 60 Mio. budget and US-$ 40 Mio. p&a spend a new hype worldwide. That will create the opportunity to re-license my original but also to make money with a new film from me named 23 YEARS LATER – RETURN TO ZOMBIE ISLAND.”
The idea is to bring the DEAD from my film back as Zombies like Ona Grauer, Will Sanderson, Tyron Leitso, Clint Howard, Elisabeth Rosen and maybe even DAS BOOT captain Juergen Prochnov. The only survivor of my original film Rudy (Jonathan Cherry) will be trying to rescue his daughter and her friends who went against his advise to the locked off island. This new film shows a group of sexy, silly, campy, horny, young adults to a sleepaway camp – but it’s not ending like LOVE ISLAND, its ending as ZOMBIE ISLAND. We go old fashioned gore and real blood effects – almost no CGI and we will win the fans and destroy this turkey what Anderson will deliver.”
According to the film’s associated IndieGogo campaign, Boll is only asking for somewhere around $14,635 USD to make the film, the entire potential pot coming with the promise that “If the movie will not be made, everyone will get the money back!”
Notably, upon navigating to the film’s official website, users are greeted with a personal ”mission statement’ from the director himself, who declares “This is not just a film. It is a warning signal. A testament to what we lost, and a call to arms for those who remain.”
“We are creating a visceral, unflinching look at the world 23 years after the fall. We are not just making a movie; we are documenting a nightmare to prevent its return. Funding this is not a contribution; it’s enlistment. We need every survivor, every soldier, every soul left listening to help us broadcast this message. This is our last stand.”
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