Legendary Reimagining Faces of Death Video Series

Previously passed around as an alleged actual snuff film, the cult mondo movie Faces of Death is getting a reboot. You read that right, the fake documentary that purported itself to be real so well that many were convinced it was, has now reached the point where Hollywood is interested in reviving it as a rebootable IP. The Hollywood Reporter brings word that Legendary Entertainment, home to Godzilla vs Kong, Pokémon Detective Pikachu, and Pacific Rim, is spearheading the project which has Isa Mazzei and Daniel Goldhaber of the 2018 horror film Cam set to write and direct the new film.

Released in 1978, Faces of Death presented itself to audiences as being an actual documentary showing allegedly real footage of gruesome deaths and mutilations, not only of humans but animals as well. The film developed a cult following but also a reputation about its contents and for being a publicly released “snuff film.” In truth, all of the death and carnage seen in the movie is falsified and simply framed as being true, akin to other movies of the era like Cannibal Holocaust.

“Each new generation discovers it, and even though things look hokey now, there are still segments that people actually believe are real that aren’t,” director John Alan Schwartz previously said in an interview. You can read more about the reputation of Faces of Death (billed as being banned in 40+ countries), and how it was all fake, over here.

Susan Montford and Don Murphy of Angry Films will produce the film which has John Burrud, producer on the original Faces of Death, also attached. The new version of the film will take its roots in a very modern issue, with THR reporting its plot will “revolve around a female moderator of a YouTube-like website, whose job is to weed out offensive and violent content and who herself is recovering from a serious trauma, that stumbles across a group that is recreating the murders from the original film. But in the story primed for the digital age and age of online misinformation, the question faced is are the murders real or fake?”

Legendary has positioned themselves in recent years as a new home for big-budget remakes and revivals though with Faces of Death just the latest they’ve snatched up. Previously it was announced that the company is developing remakes of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Toxic Avenger, Quatermass, and Gundam in addition to their upcoming re-adaptation of Dune. Legendary is also developing a big screen feature film based on the History Channel series Ancient Aliens and video games Just Cause and Mass Effect.