ROB ZOMBIE's 'Halloween' Pushed Back?

Launch Radio Networks reports: Rumors spread across the web this week that Rob Zombie was going to rewrite the script for his remake of "Halloween" after a negative review of a leaked draft of the screenplay surfaced on movie news site Ain't It Cool News. Just days after that review appeared, the web site of Fangoria magazine published an opposing piece praising the script. If the rumors are true — and there's been no official confirmation of any of this — production on the film would start later and its scheduled August 31 release date would be pushed back, according to horror movie news site Bloody-Disgusting.com.

The Ain't It Cool reviewer was disappointed in Zombie's attempt to flesh out and add a human dimension to the character of serial killer Michael Myers, who is released from an asylum years after slaughtering his sister and begins a new killing spree. Zombie himself told Launch earlier this year that he wanted to further explore the masked murderer's motivations. "The biggest difference is I wanna make Michael Myers two things," he said. "I wanna make him a lead character who you sort of know about, 'cause I think that's what it'll take to make that character then again truly terrifying. So in order, in my mind, to pump the life back into him, to make that figure terrifying when he appears onscreen, is you need to know what is happening in his brain."

Zombie posted an apparent response to the Aint It Cool review at the "Halloween" MySpace page, writing in part, "I notice that so many people get crazy when someone you don't even know posts an opinion about what they think "Halloween" will or won't be. This is crazy."

Zombie is currently in pre-production for his version of the 1978 horror classic. The movie is Zombie's third feature film as a director after 2003's "House of 1000 Corpses" and 2005's "The Devil's Rejects".

Zombie is also working on a boxed set for his previous band, WHITE ZOMBIE, as well as a solo live album.