Videodrome...so much to answer phone

Excuse the terrible Smiths pun but Cronendrome's favourite flick is making an ill advised comeback due to the creatively bereft Hollywood machine. Variety reports:


"Universal Pictures will remake the 1983 David Cronenberg-directed thriller "Videodrome," with Ehren Kruger set to write the script and produce with partner Daniel Bobker.
The producers tracked down the rights to Canadian distribution vet Rene Malo, who will be exec producer. Universal distributed the original and had first refusal on a remake, and the studio snapped up the opportunity.
The original "Videodrome" starred James Woods as the head of Civic TV Channel 83, who makes his station relevant by programming "Videodrome," a series that depicts torture and murder that transfixes viewers. The new picture will modernize the concept, infuse it with the possibilities of nano-technology and blow it up into a large-scale sci-fi action thriller.
Cronenberg has no role in the film as yet. He is prepping for MGM "The Matarese Circle" as a starring vehicle for Tom Cruise and Denzel Washington. Since Cruise appears likely to next star in the DreamWorks drama "Motorcade" and Washington has committed to the Fox drama "Unstoppable," "Circle" doesn't appear likely to get under way until later this year or 2010. Bobker/Kruger Films recently set the thriller "Dream House" at Morgan Creek and is producing, with Matthew Stillman, "The Keep" for Rogue. Kruger co-wrote the June 24 Paramount/DreamWorks release "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" with Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman."


Despair all ye with taste. Still it might revive interest in the original and no doubt be heralded with a wished for blu-ray release possibly with deleted scenes or the TV cut Cronenberg vetoed on the last Criterion release.


On that note someone finally loaded the deleted scenes on to youtube. Like most I have a VHS boot of the TV version but have never got round to transfering it, editing it and loading up the alternate scenes so it's a big thank to a more industrious soul that has and those scenes can now be enjoyed here, here and here. (I will reprint the original feature from my previous website that outlined "alternate scenes" in the near future.) Over and out commander!