'INSIDE' the HELLRAISER Remake?

Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury's À l'intérieur (INSIDE) was more than well loved around here: We worship that particularly nasty piece of business that has the good sense to lay on the intense suspense along with the red stuff. There is a rumour out there circulating that the pair of Frenchmen directors are in negotiation to direct the remake of Clive Barker's Hellraiser. Currently in development with author and writer/director of the original film doing screenwriting duties, this seems like an interesting match for the directors ability, and certainly there seems to be a recent trend of international genre directors making their debut with remakes or sequels (or remakes of sequels). For fun, let us just list a few (Alexandre Aja - from Haute Tension to The Hills Have Eyes; Juan Carlos Fresnadillo - from Intacto to 28 Weeks Later; David Moreau & Xavier Palud - from Ils to The Eye; Eric Valette - from Maléfique to One Missed Call; Nimrod Antal - from Kontroll to Vacancy; and of course the trailblazers in this department, Hideo Nakata From Ringu to Ring 2 (ahem. A remake of his own sequel) and Takashi Shimizu with his plethora of Ju-On: The Grudge films in both Japan and the US).

Like most horror fans, I'd rather some of the brighter talents out (and these two certainly qualify) there worked out personal and original projects, but the match here seems to fit well enough. Underneath all the circle-of-hell torture chambers and earthy body reconstruction, there is some pretty interesting family drama going on in there as well. If it lets these two talented directors play in a larger sandbox to work somethings out for their next original project, well then have at it.