The wait isn't over yet, but it certainly seems to finally be coming to an end. Remember when everyone had a good laugh that someone updated Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice to include zombies all the way back in 2009? And remember how many people picked it up out of morbid curiosity? And read it? And even enjoyed it? And helped launch a whole wave of monster lit?
Well, not too long after Seth Grahame-Smith turned the art of formal dancing into the art of zombie slaying, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies was announced as an upcoming film. Natalie Portman was attached for years to play free spirit Elizabeth Bennett, only dropping out repeatedly sometimes maybe occasionally?
Now she's one of the producers and Cinderella star Lily James is Lizzie. Burr Steers (Charlie St. Cloud, 17 Again) is the writer producer. Lena Headey (Game of Thrones is also listed as a star, but her character is yet unnamed on the IMDB page.
The first trailer for the action/horror/romance/comedy coming out 5 February 2016 in America is out and it's what you would expect out of a title like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. I mean, it can't be worse than that Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter film, right?
Okay, I'm playing it cool. I think Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is going to be great. We've had a lot of good Pride and Prejudice adaptations onscreen, and Grahame-Smith played really true with those story elements. He just reworked the chronology to include zombies, ninjas, and death. It's a clever gag that stays surprisingly true to the original text.
The trailer looks great. The fighting has the lyricism of dance, which is essential to the novel. They even show off the star formation, where the five Bennett sisters spin and move as one to decapitate waves of zombies. I'm so in.