Saw creator whipping up Castlevania film - Report

Konami's Castlevania film has been staked enough times to give the Impaler himself pause. First revealed in 2005 under the direction of Paul W.S. Anderson (Resident Evil, Mortal Kombat), the production has since hit myriad hang-ups and direction changes. In May, horror-enthused film site Bloody-Disgusting reported that the film had entered purgatory after a collaboration between director Sylvain White (Stomp the Yard) and writer Ian Jeffers (Death Sentence) fell through.

Like a good vampire, though, Hollywood can't keep Castlevania down. As part of Comic-Con 2009 today, James Wan, who cowrote and directed Lionsgate's horror film Saw, told Bloody-Disgusting that he would be cowriting and directing Castlevania, with Anderson producing.

"I'm very fresh on this project, so it's early stages, and I'm still trying to work things out, but the producers love my vision for it," Wan told Bloody-Disgusting. "I'll be working on the script with a writer to give it a new spin, different to the previous versions. This will have my stamp on it, which Konami is very excited about."

"The thing I love about what Konami did with Castlevania was taking the iconic Dracula mythology and Eastern-European setting and retelling it with a Japanese pop-cultural sensibility," Wan said of his vision for the film. "That's the East-meets-West tone I want to visually expand on for the film. I'm thrilled by the opportunity to make a highly stylized, fantasy, action film that focuses on the gothic storyline and the cool, anime-like characters."

Wan did not indicate when the project would begin filming, nor any other talent associated with the production.

As announced during its press conference during the 2009 Electronic Entertainment Expo, Konami has tapped Spanish studio Mercury Steam, along with Hideo Kojima's Kojima Productions, to give its venerable Castlevania franchise a reboot in 2010 on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.