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Leigh Whannell Has COOTIES!

Nordling here.

Although I think INSIDIOUS has problems with the third act, I chalk that up to the film hitting the ceiling of its budget rather than any problems with the script.  Even so, I think for the budget, it's remarkably successful, in profit and in execution.  It's a fun horror ride, and I think Leigh Whannell's script is smart, funny, and suitably creepy when it needs to be.

I don't know if this film would ever happen, but the plot and the title were so intriguing to me that I had to write it up.  At a recent INSIDIOUS Q&A, reported by Bleeding Cool, Whannell talked about a recent script he pitched called COOTIES:

I actually just wrote a comedy about a zombie virus that breaks out in a primary school but only effects people who haven’t been through puberty. There’s all these eight or nine year olds running around and the teachers are holed up inside the school. And the title of the film is…? Cooties. That’s just an out and out comedy.

I love that idea - kiddie zombies attacking their school.  We've seen enough zombie movies these days that any fresh take on the genre is welcome.  Besides, who hasn't wanted to bash the brains of some annoying brat?  I could even see sequels - at a Justin Bieber concert, at Disney World... the possibilities are endless.  Obviously this would have to be played for laughs, and I can see the protest lines forming even now.  If you inject a little social commentary into it, you have the potential for something that could be as funny and as important as SHAUN OF THE DEAD.  I hope someone sees this for that potential and makes it.  With Whannell's track record, and with a reasonable budget, I don't see how this could lose.

Nordling, out.

Readers Talkback
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  • April 18, 2011, 2:21 p.m. CST

    Oh, shit...just when you thought you'd seen it all....

    by darthderp

  • April 18, 2011, 2:24 p.m. CST

    It would have to be Snyder-style zombies and not Romero-style

    by darthderp

    Never met an 8 year old yet that didn't move at one speed - full tilt boogie!

  • April 18, 2011, 2:25 p.m. CST

    So it's South Park's Pinkeye episode

    by Domi'sInnerChild

    I'm in.

  • April 18, 2011, 2:29 p.m. CST

    and LarryTheCableGuy has crabs!

    by LarryTheCableGuy

  • April 18, 2011, 2:29 p.m. CST

    I can feel Fox News' blood pressure rising already

    by steve

    Should be like Machete to the power of 1000

  • April 18, 2011, 2:31 p.m. CST

    Children of Men... Of the Dead

    by D.Vader

    End of humanity as we know it.

  • April 18, 2011, 2:34 p.m. CST

    Instead of a gunshot to the head, chuck a dodge ball at 'em!

    by darthderp

    That ought to stifle a few protests...

  • April 18, 2011, 2:44 p.m. CST

    I'll only support this if it is extremely violent and satirical

    by lv_426

    rated R, with the infected kids acting like the most horrible nasty little buggers ever imagined, and not some tame watered down PG-13 thing which is what it will most likely be.

  • April 18, 2011, 2:58 p.m. CST

    THAT KID FROM HANCOCK AND THE UNBORN WOULD BE PERFEQT

    by Meadowe

    Seriously, even when he's playing a normal kid, he looks pretty creepy imo. And maybe add jake lloyd, even though he's like full grown now he looks like a hideous freaqin kid. Oh, and this could lose by being a decent movie and then being bastardized over and over with a lot of flashback inspired sequels a la his saw franchise.

  • April 18, 2011, 3:05 p.m. CST

    Dickholster - HELL YEAH IT"S COOL!

    by BeanGrud

  • April 18, 2011, 3:06 p.m. CST

    Marvel Zombies.

    by UltimaRex

    How far away are we now?

  • Haven't seen it though.

  • April 18, 2011, 4:12 p.m. CST

    Just make Dead Space 2 the movie and put those fucked up zombie kids in

    by Col. Tigh-Fighter

    Hard R! Not enough zombie kids get massacred nowadays! Was some good zombie kid deaths in the original DOTD and RE2 :)

  • April 18, 2011, 4:25 p.m. CST

    As long as one of the kids is Jaden Smiff and he gets brutally murdered.

    by SierraTangoFoxtrotUniform

  • The poster is a close-up shot of a boy, cold black eyes, covered with blood, entrails hanging out of his mouth. Tagline underneath: SOMEONE NEEDS A TIME-OUT.

  • April 18, 2011, 4:26 p.m. CST

    Say what now?

    by sickerandsweeter

    I loved "Insidious" third act! It kept building. Did anyone notice the lack of CGI in that film? I hated "Dead Silence" and I didn't want to hate it, cause I was such a huge fan of "Saw". But man alive, "Insidious" was a fantastic film with hardly any problems. Unless you were expecting another "Rosemary's Baby"

  • April 18, 2011, 4:26 p.m. CST

    Imagine the "Happy Meal" you could put together for this film...

    by WriteForTheEdit

  • April 18, 2011, 4:27 p.m. CST

    "YOU THOUGHT YOUR KID WAS TROUBLE?"

    by WriteForTheEdit

    COOTIES. COMING SOON.

  • April 18, 2011, 4:29 p.m. CST

    "I DON'T THINK RITALIN IS THE ANSWER..."

    by WriteForTheEdit

    COOTIES. COMING SOON.

  • April 18, 2011, 4:31 p.m. CST

    "NAP TIME JUST BECAME DIRT-NAP TIME."

    by WriteForTheEdit

    COOTIES. COMING SOON.

  • April 18, 2011, 5:47 p.m. CST

    What's the name of that fucking pedo who directed the movie "KIDS"?

    by Professor_Monster

    They should get him to do this and it shouold have a HARD X on the fucker.

  • April 18, 2011, 6:05 p.m. CST

    professor_monster: Larry Clark

    by Elgyn6655321

    He actually made one really decent movie and that was "Bully".

  • April 18, 2011, 6:23 p.m. CST

    "YOUR GROUNDED"

    by Turingtestee

    My wife hated Bully. Didn't the lead die of an overdose?

  • April 18, 2011, 6:59 p.m. CST

    The Girl Who Owned a City

    by The Dwayne

    Basically it's the story of that but with zombies thrown in. Also, if they wanted to have "child zombies" running around, just make a more faithful adaptation of Silent Hill.

  • April 18, 2011, 7:02 p.m. CST

    zombies are boring...

    by alienindisguise

    and are for writers and directors with no real talent.

  • April 18, 2011, 7:21 p.m. CST

    Re: alienindisguise

    by MakNeil

    Yeah, Frank Darabont is a talentless hack. And George Romero (particularly the earlier films in his filmography) is quite possibly the worse director ever. Yeah, and Edgar Wright's Shawn of the Dead was pure crap. And that David Cronenberg, has got to be the worse (while he has technically not done a zombie film per se, Rabid's infected are very similar to Zach Snyder's sprinting zombies). If all the sarcasm above doesn't alert you to the fact that you don't know shite about good genre films or directors, then nothing will.

  • April 19, 2011, 9:26 a.m. CST

    Sounds Like Recess Pieces

    by aerostarmonk

    I knew this sounded so damn familiar and so I started looking everywhere trying to remember what it reminded me of and I finally found it: http://www.amazon.com/Recess-Pieces-Bob-Fingerman/dp/1593074506 "The creator behind Beg the Question and Finger Filth, Fingerman gives the world another helping of outright fun with this Our Gang Meets Dawn of the Dead gene-splicing. When an elementary school science experiment goes awry and causes several of the children and teachers to become flesh-eating zombies, it's every kid for himself. The grade-schoolers must give just as gorily as they get, gruesomely and gleefully rising to the occasion, with one kid memorably converting a clunky industrial arts paper cutter into a very effective zombie deterrent. Refreshingly peopled with a multiethnic band of well-defined young characters, those not put off by the hilariously grisly content will find Fingerman's dark sense of humor is in overdrive, and his lush, offal-drenched artwork is a delight. Beware: despite starring a cast of children, this is in no way a children's comic, as it is replete with realistically frank language and extremely graphic depictions of violence and entrails-munching cannibalism. Fingerman hits one out of the park with this perfect antidote to stodgy "summer" reading."

  • April 19, 2011, 11:39 a.m. CST

    aerostarmonk

    by CrusherJen

    You beat me to it! But it's nice to see I'm not the only one who read that book.

  • April 19, 2011, 4:24 p.m. CST

    crusherjen

    by aerostarmonk

    Yeah. It doesn't seem as popular as you think something like it would be. When I first read the premise of this project I thought it was an adaptation. I'm not sure why they just don't pick up the property altogether. This is a hard sale even as a comedy. I'm fairly certain that the only way you could get people in the States to buy into it is by making it animated. There's a reason Battle Royale is mainly a cult classic outside of Japan. And it's not just the language barrier.