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Based on the graphic novel by Steve Niles, 30 Days of Night came out in 2007, just as vampire popularity surged. The vampires in 30 Days, however, weren't of the twinkling-in-the-sunlight variety, but were bloodthirsty killers who only spoke in an ancient language. The movie doubled its budget upon release, and saw its director, David Slade, move on to direct the other kind of vampire movie with Twilight Saga: Eclipse. Writer-director Ben Ketai took over and 30 Days continued with the next volume, 30 Days of Night: Dark Days.
Dark Days follows Stella (Kiele Sanchez taking over for Melissa George), the survivor of the vampire attack in Barrow, Alaska, as she heads to Los Angeles to hunt down the undead who killed her husband. Ketai recently told ShockTillYouDrop that the sequel remains "faithful" to Niles' graphic novel.
Even more Days of night could be on their way >> Posted 08.04.10 by Ryan -
Less than two weeks ago, the first still image from the set of 30 Days of Night: Dark Days was released showing Kiele Sanchez taking over for Melissa George as Stella. 30 Days creator and Dark Days writer Steve Niles originally said that they decided to cast "slightly younger" because they hoped to make more movies based on the multitude of 30 Days graphic novels.
However, in a recent interview with Bloody Disgusting, he said that there were other issues that factored in the decision.
Schedule. The enemy of all casting. [Melissa George has] got a million gazillion things going on right now, so we couldn't fit it.
As far as plans for another film after Dark Days, possibly based on the Return to Barrow graphic novel, Niles said the main concern right now is getting Dark Days "in the can."
If that goes well, we're set up to move forward. We got a great young cast that we can bring along if this works out well, and we';ll be ready to keep going with the story. Plus, the comics are done. God, what do we have, like seven different graphic novels now if it actually took off?
30 Days of Night: Dark Days is expected to debut in 2010.
Posted 11.20.09 by BrentJS -
It's only been a little more than two weeks since it was announced that Kiele Sanchez would be stepping in to replace Melissa George as Stella in the sequel to 30 Days of Night, but the production is already underway in Vancouver. Irish Rican of AICN visited the set and returned with the first still image from Dark Days, showing a bloodied and bruised Sanchez wielding a massive knife.
30 Days of Night and 30 Days of Night: Dark Days are closely based on the comic books by Steve Niles, who also co-wrote the script for Dark Days. There are plans to adapt other books in the series, which factored into the decision to bring in Sanchez to play the lead role.
30 Days of Night: Dark Days does not have an official release date as of yet, but it is expected to debut in 2010.
Posted 11.10.09 by BrentJS -
When the cast for 30 Days of Night: Dark Days was revealed, there was still no word on whether Melissa George would reprise her role of Stella for the sequel. But now we know. 30 Days co-creator and Dark Days co-screenwriter Steve Niles told Dread Central that Kiele Sanchez will take over for George.
She's been in Lost, and she's really good. We are really happy about the casting. We are casting slightly younger on this because of our hopes of moving right into (film versions) of the other books. There's what, ten (30 Days) graphic novels now? So we are hoping at the very least that we can tell the main trilogy, which is 30 Days of Night, Dark Days, and Return to Barrow.
Niles says the movie will follow the comic even more closely than the original.
If people remember the comic at all, Stella's original plan was to expose the vampires (for what they were) because the one thing she discovered from having her town destroyed was that basically what vampires fear most in the world is having their existence proven. Just like in the comic, her initial idea is to tell the world the truth of what happened in Barrow, Alaska, because it was covered up as an "accident" like every other vampire attack. So that's her first mission, but then she realizes that hunting them might be more fun and more effective.
Niles says the sequel will also introduce characters that will blur the line between good and evil.
In the comic, we do get exposed to our first sympathetic vampire — a character who has fought his hunger and who has found other ways (of feeding) other than killing people to survive. We also bring in a new character we are really excited about: Agent Norris. He's the equivalent of the "Ben Foster" character (from the original). He's thehuman spy, and he's this really despicable FBI agent who wants to become a vampire and who abuses the power of being a law enforcement officer on top of wanting to be a vampire. He can do a lot of damage.
Dark Days is currently in production.
Posted 10.23.09 by Ryan -
The cast of the upcoming sequel to 30 Days of Night has been divulged, just in time for the month-long shoot in Vancouver, which starts today. 30 Days of Night: Dark Days will follow Stella (played by Melissa George in the original) as she travels to Los Angeles to join a group of vampire hunters and seek revenge against those who attacked her town and killed her husband.
Bloody-Disgusting revealed the cast list, which includes Mia Kirshner (The L Word) as the lead vampire Lillith, Harold Perrineau (28 Weeks Later), Diora Baird (the upcoming Night of the Demons), Kiele Sanchez (A Perfect Getaway), Monique Ganderton, and Rhys Coiro (Entourage) in an unspecified lead role.
There's still no word on whether George will return as Stella, though 30 Days creator Steve Niles wants her back for the sequel.
Posted 10.20.09 by Ryan -
There's no denying that vampire popularity is at an all-time high or that, thanks to the likes of Stephenie Meyer, it's still on the rise. But despite the popular perception that vampire movies have been taking a "dirt-nap" since the '90s, that's not exactly true.
We look back at the two decades of movie undead that preceded the Cullens, a period that offers some awesome fanged films — and a few that should have stayed buried — in our Vampire Movie Timeline.
Posted 10.16.09 by reelz -
30 Days of Night: Dark Days is starting production in Vancouver this month, but its studio is yet to confirm whether Melissa George, who played heroine Stella in 30 Days of Night, will return. Steve Niles, the comic book's creator and co-screenwriter of Dark Days, told MTV he wants George to return for the sequel.
What we want to do is try to get Melissa back. Basically, she's the only survivor of the first movie, really, so there weren't that many people to bring back because they got killed. So we're going to try that, and all the other casting is new characters. We're actively doing that right now.
Stella will have a larger role in Dark Days, which sees her traveling to Los Angeles to join a group of vampire hunters and seek revenge on those who attached her Alaskan home town and killed her husband (Josh Hartnett).
Posted 10.15.09 by Ryan -
As reported last month, 30 Days of Night: Dark Days, the sequel to 30 Days of Night, is pushing forward. ShockTillYouDrop is circulating a brief synopsis for the movie.
Sequel to 2007 vampire horror hit about a lonely and desperate woman who joins a group of rogue vampire hunters to seek revenge on the bloodsuckers responsible for an attack on her tiny Alaska town.
30 Days of Night director David Slade is too busy directing The Twilight Saga: Eclipse to return, so Ben Ketai, veteran of two 30 Days of Night webseries, will helm the project from a script he co-wrote with comic book creator Steve Niles. Shooting begins October 20 in Vancouver, BC. Casting is underway, with no confirmation whether Melissa George will reprise her role as Stella, though it is believed that she will be re-cast.
Posted 10.13.09 by Ryan -
The original 30 Days of Night movie, released in 2007, was one of the forerunners of Hollywood's resurgent interest in vampire movies, so it's no wonder that a sequel is in the works now that America's in the throes of vampire mania thanks to movies like Twilight and HBO's True Blood. According to a recent report, shooting on 30 Day of Night: Dark Days is expected to begin in October in Vancouver, Canada, with Ben Ketai directing from a script that he wrote with Steve Niles, creator of the comic book series that inspired the features.
It was also reported that the character of Stella Oleson, played by Melissa George in the first movie, would be recast. There's no word on whether Josh Hartnett, who played Eben Oleson, Stella's estranged husband and the hero of the first movie, will appear in the sequel. Eben became a vampire at the end of 30 Days of Night, but if the movie sequel follows the comic book sequel, Dark Days, Eben may be resurrected, opening the door for Hartnett to return.
Posted 09.04.09 by BrentJS -
Vampire movies had been out of vogue since the '90s, taking a "dirt nap" until 2008's Twilight regurgitated them back into popular culture in a big way. Now there's a whole host of vampire-themed movies and TV shows to choose from, supplanting this decade's zombie fixation with their pale-skinned supernatural brethren.
Fantasy author and movie producer Neil Gaiman (Coraline, Stardust) was recently asked about the importance of vampires in cinema, and he ultimately said that vampire movies should go back to the grave from whence they came. Gaiman gave credence to a few vampire movies, however, which he said helped to broaden the genre. One movie Gaiman cited was Roman Polanski's Dance of the Vampires (1967), which called into question the long-established belief that vampires are afraid of crosses.
Dance of the Vampires has that wonderful moment where Alfie Bass as the Jewish innkeeper has been bitten and transformed by the vampires. He comes back, he creeps into the bedroom, and she holds up the cross, and he says, ''Lady, have you got the wrong vampire." It was one of those occasions where something either crept out of the film and became a joke, or crept out of joke world and crept into the film.
Gaiman said that Lost Boys (1987) depicted vampirism as a state that's not necessarily undesirable, which is similar to the way vampirism is depicted today.
And then in a sort of continuous transmutation, you had Lost Boys, which is essentially vampirism as wish fulfillment — it was really the first time you can absolutely take a pin and point to these great vampire moments on celluloid or on video, or in print, whatever, where people really seemed to have looked around and gone, "What is the downside of this thing again? Hang on, you get to live forever, you get to be absolutely sexually attractive and you don't have zits."
Gaiman explained that vampire movies can never be about gaining power on a grand scale, using 30 Days of Night (2007) as an example.
Even when you get to things like 30 Days of Night, you're looking at people going and invading a little town that's on the edge of nowhere and that nobody's going to notice. It never seems to be about power. It never seems to be about taking over the world. Because the moment it does, it's not vampire fiction anymore.
When it comes to the new wave of vampire fanaticism resulting from the Twilight phenomena, Gaiman couldn't be bothered to comment. Instead, he predicted the imminent demise of the genre.
Vampires go in waves, and it kind of feels like now we're finishing a vampire wave; at the point where they're everywhere. It's probably time to go back underground for another 20 or 25 years.
Posted 08.30.09 by BrentJS