"Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter"

Okay, so... I don't want to be "that guy," but... didn't we learn from "Snakes on a Plane" that the whole "OMG LOL THATLOOKSLIKEAFAKEMOVIEBUTITSAREALMOVIE LMAO!!!" thing drives up your online traffic but doesn't actually get people into theaters?



This got greenlit a few years ago, back when "actual books that look like parody book-titles from a Simpsons background-gag" like this were a big bookstore fad. The progenitor of the trend, "Pride & Prejudice & Zombies," has gone through about a dozen failed starts so far.

I hate to be a spoilsport, because I like most of what I'm seeing - Bekmembatov, Burton etc. clearly understand that the central joke of Lincoln-as-Blade is funnier if the movie keeps a straight face and doesn't acknowledge that it knows it's funny; and that last shot is just about perfect - but that's the problem: is "Hah! This exists!" amusing enough to sustain a whole movie... and will people show up to find out?

I haven't read the original book yet (guess now I should...) but I'm given to understand that the "key" (and the reason it initially "broke-out" from the parody-book pack) is a certain degree of political-subtext drawing paralells between Vampirism and The Confederacy - in this version, vampire-hunting is Abe's "true calling;" and he becomes President and wages Civil War because The South is actually controlled by vampires who use the slave-trade as an easy food supply. That's clever, and if it makes it to the movie intact one imagines the outcry from the "stop picking on us!!!!" Lost Cause Revisionism crowd will be entertaining as hell in and of itself...