Guillermo del Toro has long been trying to direct a movie called At the Mountains of Madness, which is based on a H.P. Lovecraft novella of the same name. A while ago, we learned that the movie fell through and it was reported that Universal was afraid of its $150 million budget, even though Tom Cruise was set to star.

Del Toro paints a very different picture though, one that includes Ridley Scott’s return to science fiction. He believed that the two films would have been too similar, which makes sense you realize that Alien was inspired in part by Lovecraft’s work.

Del Toro explained on his site:

Prometheus started filming a while ago- right at the time we were in preproduction on Pacific Rim. The title itself gave me pause- knowing that Alien was heavily influenced by Lovecraft and his novella.

This time, decades later with the budget and place Ridley Scott occupied, I assumed the Greek metaphor alluded at the creation aspects of the HPL book. I believe I am right and if so, as a fan, I am delighted to see a new RS science fiction film, but this will probably mark a long pause -if not the demise- of ATMOM.

How similar could they be though? Friends with Benefits and No Strings Attached, two movies based on the same premise but vastly different, came out last year. And there are two very different Snow White movies coming out this year. What’s so bad about two films inspired by Lovecraft? Del Toro explains that too:

Same premise. Scenes that would be almost identical. Both movies seem to share identical set pieces and the exact same BIG REVELATION (twist) at the end. I won’t spoil it.

Well, damn. Of course, del Toro doesn’t seem to know specifics but he has an idea of what’s going on. Is he that well-versed in Lovecraft? Did he have a talk with studio execs or Prometheus writer Damon Lindelof? Who knows. It’s quite sad that it pretty much killed del Toro’s dream project, though. [IndieWire via Movies.com]

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