Eli Roth is currently enjoying the awards season run for “Inglorious Basterds” but he took a few moments to chat with IGN about a number of projects that he has on his slate, which, once the ceremonies and parties end on Sunday, March 7th, he’ll get back to work on.
“The Last Exorcism” aka “Cotton” – Last fall, Roth said he hoped the Louisiana exorcism film, produced by him and directed by Daniel Stamm, would premiere at this year’s Sundance. Though the film didn’t end up screening at the festival, Roth says the film is “very close to closing a deal with a distributor.” Hmm, so the Lionsgate deal announced last week isn’t quite finished? But once all the names are signed on the dotted line we’re guessing this will hit theaters this year.
“The Man With The Iron Fist” – Roth says he hopes to get his martial-arts film written by RZA (you can read his rambling description of the film here) in front cameras in August if they can work out the logistics. No word yet if he’s directing or just producing this one (we’re guessing the latter), but we’ll have to wait and see.
“Endangered Species” – Though it seemed Roth was close to having the script finished on this sci-fi adventure last fall, it appears there’s still a bit of work to do. He says, “I really just need to finish the script. But all this awards-season stuff has come up and I don’t want to miss it. In a month, it’ll be gone, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be involved in a project like this again. I don’t want to look back and go, ‘God, I shouldn’t have been in such a rush.’ I’m having a blast and enjoying myself. I want to see this one through and then I’ll be able to focus on ‘Endangered.'”
“Thanksgiving” – The spin-off from his “Grindhouse” short appears to be a long way off. He says, “I’d love to do it, but it’s lower priority…I’ve been working on a script…We’re outlining kills…” Doesn’t sound too hopeful that it will get in front of cameras anytime soon, but you never know.
Though we’re not exactly huge fans of Roth’s past films, his expansion into martial arts and particularly sci-fi are intriguing and certainly parallel the interest in genre films like his buddy Quentin Tarantino. And certainly the prospect of a RZA scripted martial arts flick sounds pretty exciting. We’re definitely curious to see where these projects go.