This 3% Rotten Video Game Adaptation Is Rising From the Grave With a New Reboot

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Paul W. S. Anderson

A strange creature looking at Ellie Cornell in House of the Dead

After an ill-fated foray into movie theaters twenty years ago, The House of the Dead is opening its doors again. The venerable Sega horror video game franchise is set to return to the big screen, and a veteran of console-to-screen adaptations is leading the way. Deadline reports that Resident Evil's Paul W.S. Anderson will write and direct the new film.

The House of the Dead franchise began in 1996 with the arcade game of the same name, which was an early use of so-called "fast zombies"; they would subsequently be popularized with Zack Snyder's 2005 remake of Dawn of the Dead. Anderson tells Deadline that the film will adapt the third game in the series, 2002's The House of the Dead III. It will center around Lisa Rogan, a woman who's trying to rescue her father from hordes of the undead, and Daniel Curien, whose father created the creatures in the first place. And although Anderson is a veteran of the horror-game-to-screen genre, don't expect a repeat of Resident Evil: "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."

Was 'The House of the Dead' Adapted Into a Movie Already?

The House of the Dead was previously adapted for the screen by controversial director Uwe Boll in 2003. Intended as a prequel to the games, it centered around a group who travel to a remote island for a rave, only to find the island crawling with ravenous zombies. The film was torn apart by critics, and currently holds a 3% Rotten rating on Rotten Tomatoes; earlier this year, Collider's Jeremy Urquhart ranked it #1 on his list of the worst zombie movies ever made. It grossed 13.8 million on a $12 million budget, and spawned a sequel, House of the Dead 2, that premiered on the Sci-Fi Channel in 2006. Boll went on to direct a number of video game adaptations, including Alone in the Dark, BloodRayne, In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale, Postal, and Far Cry; all were largely rejected by audiences and critics.

In addition to writing and directing, Anderson will produce The House of the Dead with Jeremy Bolt, Sega’s Toru Nakahara, Story Kitchen’s Dmitri M. Johnson, Mike Goldberg, and Dan Jevons. Timothy I. Stevenson will executive produce.

The House of the Dead is in development; no release date has yet been announced. Stay tuned to Collider for future updates.

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