Dig through the ditches and burn all your bridges

July 13, 2022 1:00 PM

Coming soon to a theater near you: Rob Zombie's 'The Munsters'

YouTube description:
The first official trailer for Rob Zombie's 'The Munsters' is here. Adapted from the popular television series the film stars Jeff Daniel Phillips, Sheri Zombie Moon and Daniel Roebuck amongst others.

The film is set for release later this year. Watch this space.

Comments are turned off.

posted by Atom Eyes (106 comments total)

Am I missing some key references here? Because this looks objectively terrible. I'm happy to revise my opinion though.
posted by jquinby at 1:06 PM on July 13, 2022 [7 favorites]

I heard "Rob Zombie is directing a Munsters movie" and thought Well, sure, that not only makes sense but will most likely be better than it has any reason to be and now I am reconsidering many, many priors.
posted by Etrigan at 1:06 PM on July 13, 2022 [11 favorites]

I thought The Adams Family films did a pretty good job of updating the premise to make it relevant to the time period but this looks awful. A 60s parody of 20s-30s films, this is several generations removed from any semblance of saying anything that today's audience wants.

Maybe it will turnout to be an inoffensive screwball comedy but the trailer does not inspire confidence.
posted by AndrewStephens at 1:08 PM on July 13, 2022

Here's where I land on Rob Zombie: I love that this guy is now rich enough to like make stuff he wants to make no matter how objectively bad it is. He swings for ridiculous fences and is clearly passionate for his flavour of horror nostalgia. I admire that. I really do.

Godspeed with whatever this is, though.
posted by Kitteh at 1:10 PM on July 13, 2022 [18 favorites]

I thought it looked pretty fun. I think it has potential. I used to watch the tv show on Nick at Night every night. (Munsters Monday! Lucy Tuesday! Bewitched Bewednesday! Something Thursday! Kotter Friday! Or something like that!) I do think Grandpa looks very weird & that mustache bothers me. He's not a mustache guy.
posted by bleep at 1:11 PM on July 13, 2022 [7 favorites]

Agreed. The mustache is unacceptable.
posted by Windopaene at 1:20 PM on July 13, 2022 [5 favorites]

> Comments are turned off.

Don't know why this post is linking to an obscure YouTube channel with a 720p version of the trailer, but here is the The Munsters - a Rob Zombie film - Official trailer in 1080p on Universal Studios' official YouTube channel... (Spoiler: It doesn't make the trailer any better.) And the comments are turned on.
posted by jca at 1:26 PM on July 13, 2022 [7 favorites]

this looks




awful.
posted by djseafood at 1:30 PM on July 13, 2022 [4 favorites]

All of the above -- I was vaguely stoked about this, the idea of Rob Zombie smushing some giallo-influenced goofy/extreme horror sensibilities into a hoary old second-tier (the Addams Family ruled, come on) TV property seemed like an idea with legs.

But it feels unfunny in the worst sense of "tries to be funny and falls short," as opposed to aiming in a number of directions that could have worked really well. Maybe there's some sort of genius riff in here on all the bad cable TV revivals of classic sitcoms that proliferated in the late '90s and '00s -- it looks like low-budget badly written basic-cable fare intentionally. But I have a sinking feeling that this isn't that.
posted by Shepherd at 1:46 PM on July 13, 2022 [3 favorites]

I used to love Fred Gywnne on Car 54, Where Are You? and of course as Herman. I don't think the new guy can cut it.
posted by Catblack at 1:50 PM on July 13, 2022 [7 favorites]

I just recently learned that, later in life, Fred Gwynne became a writer/illustrator of some beloved children's books.
posted by Atom Eyes at 2:00 PM on July 13, 2022 [8 favorites]

Wow, this new Sierra FMV game looks great! Hopefully they can get it done in time for Christmas 1997.
posted by uncleozzy at 2:03 PM on July 13, 2022 [16 favorites]

I had heard nothing of this until today. For some reason, though, I am reminded of a law I formulated decades ago: if the stars going on late night talk shows to promote will only say how much fun they had making it, the movie will be awful.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 2:03 PM on July 13, 2022 [3 favorites]

Versus the Addams Family: The Addams family films latched on to what made the original charming and ran with that. This doesn't seem to have any of the charm of The Munsters TV show which was, like Addams Family, a take on the traditional TV Nuclear Family vibe. Ramping up the "a vampire and a frankenstein, I bet they have wacky cartoony adventures!" doesn't fit.

Also a reminder of the 1980s remake (which had 3 seasons and 73 episodes?!?) which did seem to build on the formula, or the 2010s remake which was...okay?
posted by AzraelBrown at 2:03 PM on July 13, 2022 [2 favorites]

I really don't get why anybody would say this looks so awful. I mean, you've seen the original show, right? This film looks like a lightly modernized take in the vein of The Addams Family movies. It's clearly made with a lot of affection for the old show, and if you liked the original there probably won't be anything here that pisses you off. I'm glad Zombie isn't going for some "bold new re-imagining" where everything is super dark and Herman rips off people's heads or whatever. It's The Munsters, FFS. It's supposed to be goofy, campy and fun!

What puzzles me is that it looks so much like a cheapo, basic cable movie instead of a theatrical film. It seems like it should already have a cult following of young adults who saw it on TV dozens of times when they were kids. I fully expect it to tank at the box-office and then it'll be on TV every Halloween for the rest of our lives. It'll be like Halloweentown or Hocus Pocus or The Worst Witch or other things that aren't really very good but if you see them when you're 9 you'll love them forever.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 2:07 PM on July 13, 2022 [10 favorites]

What the hell is wrong with that trailer? Not commenting on the content but the production value of the trailer is like 90's public access.
posted by Dr. Twist at 2:11 PM on July 13, 2022 [9 favorites]

I really don't get why anybody would say this looks so awful. [...] What puzzles me is that it looks so much like a cheapo, basic cable movie instead of a theatrical film

I think you answered your own question. Also all the dialog / VO sounds like it was recorded with a phone mic in a closet and the audio mix is baffling.
posted by uncleozzy at 2:12 PM on July 13, 2022 [7 favorites]

I really don't get why anybody would say this looks so awful.

Because it looks awful.

What puzzles me is that it looks so much like a cheapo, basic cable movie instead of a theatrical film.

In other words: it looks awful.

[Upon preview: sorry, didn't mean to pile-on. But yes, the dreadful all-around production values are baffling!]
posted by Atom Eyes at 2:14 PM on July 13, 2022 [2 favorites]

I don't know. I think the casting of Lea Michele as Lily Munster is kind of genius.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 2:30 PM on July 13, 2022 [5 favorites]

We could have had Mockingbird Lane, but instead we get...this.
posted by Faint of Butt at 2:35 PM on July 13, 2022 [5 favorites]

This looks like a porn parody.
posted by juniper at 2:37 PM on July 13, 2022 [24 favorites]

I don't think I like the voice of Herman, Grandpa in general, and the woman playing Lily seems to be overacting. Also, I'm not sure what the plot is. It seems to be Herman and Lily meeting, dating, and moving to America? Parts of that could make a good story, but all told, it looks like a mess to me.
posted by Spike Glee at 2:37 PM on July 13, 2022 [1 favorite]

"the 2010s remake"...

Jerry O'Connell? Portia de Rossi?! Eddie Izzard?!! What the f... Ok, well I guess I'm following up on THAT later.

Anyway. I saw a teaser of this a while back that was a shot for shot remake of the original Munsters opening. I watched it side-by-side with the original and I was struck by how charming the original actors were in their body language and emotion and the new actors were.. not.
posted by Horkus at 2:39 PM on July 13, 2022 [4 favorites]

Well, I don't necessarily agree that looks kinda cheap = looks awful. I unironically adore the original Land of the Lost and Doctor Who, for example, and both of those shows were put together with a lot of papier-mache and gumption. But this looks kinda cheap in such a weirdly specific way that I figure it's got to be deliberate, at least to some extent.

I'm guessing Zombie is going for a cheapo, retro look in keeping with the original series, but it just misses that and ends up looking more like a Nick or Disney Channel movie instead. Maybe it's something about it being in color? The original show was trying to look like an old Universal horror picture crossed with a 60s sitcom and they totally nailed that, but this movie doesn't look like Universal stuff at all beyond the old logo at the beginning. It kind of plays more like a 90s throwback than a 60s or 30s throwback. I don't think a campy Munsters movie that looks like it should be on basic cable is an inherently heinous thing, at all. But for a movie from a successful horror director, going out to theaters in 2022, this does look odd. Whatever you might have been expecting, this isn't that.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 2:44 PM on July 13, 2022

I certainly won't begrudge Mr. Zombie for indulging his passion, nor will I criticize his casting, directing, etc.

But this doesn't look very entertaining, no matter what lens I try to see it through.

I will say, though, that the BOLD COLORS are...BOLD.
posted by davidmsc at 2:46 PM on July 13, 2022

Why is this trailer two and a half minutes long?
posted by schoolgirl report at 2:53 PM on July 13, 2022 [2 favorites]

I am really puzzled by how low-budget this looks, including the production values and shoddy editing. And how neither the actors nor the editor of the trailer seem to have any sense of comic timing.

A good Munsters production does not need a big budget. It does need excellent comic acting and writing.
posted by Quasirandom at 3:03 PM on July 13, 2022 [5 favorites]

Am I missing some key references here? Because this looks objectively terrible.

Have you ever seen The Munsters? It's objectively terrible.
posted by dobbs at 3:11 PM on July 13, 2022 [5 favorites]

What the hell is wrong with that trailer? Not commenting on the content but the production value of the trailer is like 90's public access.

Aside from the aforementioned audio problems, it's not in 24 frames per second (example). Your mind is watching it as "cheap video made on a GoPro".
posted by JoeZydeco at 3:11 PM on July 13, 2022 [2 favorites]

This looks really garish in the same way Batman & Robin or Dick Tracy looked garish. Intense colored light everywhere.

I have no attachment to the original show so I have no opinions on how true to it this looks. I just approve of the colors.
posted by egypturnash at 3:17 PM on July 13, 2022 [1 favorite]

Off the top of my head, TV shows from my childhood (some from before) that are still waiting to be given the 21st century movie treatment:

- My Mother the Car
- Courtship of Eddie's Father
- Me and the Chimp
- The Governor & JJ
- The Ugliest Girl in Town
- Time Tunnel mashed up with It's About Time
- The Good Guys
- Rat Patrol
- F Troop
- Hogan's Heroes was done a few years ago, right?
- Petticoat Junction
- Judd for the Defense
- Turn-On (a behind the scenes look at a show that gets cancelled almost as soon as it hits the air)
- The Generation Gap (maybe the first game show turned into a movie, but this one's interesting because the host clearly had substance problems)
- Bracken's World
- Cannon
- The Storefront Lawyers
- Longstreet

Why, yes, I once had a TV Guide collection. Why do you ask?
posted by morspin at 3:33 PM on July 13, 2022 [5 favorites]

This looks like a porn parody.

Can we have both? Asking for a friend.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 3:46 PM on July 13, 2022 [2 favorites]

Hogan's Heroes was done a few years ago, right?

Doubtful. Here's a 2019 Deadline article saying original series co-creator Al Ruddy was planning a reboot "adventure comedy series set in present day focusing on the descendants of the original heroes, now scattered around the world, who team up for a global treasure hunt," which sounds stupid. Ruddy's IMDB pages doesn't mention Hogan's Heroes, but it does say he's working on a Cannonball Run reboot.
posted by kirkaracha at 3:52 PM on July 13, 2022

TV shows from my childhood (some from before) that are still waiting to be given the 21st century movie treatment:

I jump around some decades here:

Have Gun Will Travel (I mean, the Mandalorian is pretty much this except he's a man WITH armor in a savage land)
My Three Sons
Bonanza
Buck Rogers in the Twenty Fifth Century (And yes it needs disco goddammit)
BJ and the Bear
Grizzly Adams
The Love Boat (Every week reality TV show stars come on and get Norovirus)
Moonlighting
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 3:54 PM on July 13, 2022 [4 favorites]

The original Addams Family movie trailer is approximately 1,000 times better in every way.
posted by kirkaracha at 3:55 PM on July 13, 2022 [9 favorites]

BJ and the Bear

Don't forget Sheriff Lobo!
posted by 445supermag at 4:09 PM on July 13, 2022 [3 favorites]

The theme music is so wonderful. It makes me want to watch the whole series again. And by whole series I mean WandaVision.
posted by Ber at 4:11 PM on July 13, 2022 [3 favorites]

Off the top of my head, TV shows from my childhood (some from before) that are still waiting to be given the 21st century movie treatment:

I noticed that during the mid-nineties era when the C-list shows like Sgt. Bilko and Car 54, Where Are You? were getting feature films, the big prize was never mentioned: Gilligan’s Island. I have read it was due to a hopeless morass over the film rights. Tell me, though, that 1990s Brian Dennehy would not have made a perfect Skipper.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 4:55 PM on July 13, 2022 [9 favorites]

Wow, that was spectacularly terrible. It was like a low-budget Youtuber's amateur production of "What if Rob Zombie made a Munsters Movie using only his iPhone?" but with worse production values.

The only actor that remotely fit the part was Grandpa. Herman was a huge mistake and Lily was overacting even by Elvira, Mistress of the Dark standards.

At 0:55 Grandpa makes a Nosferatu* clone appear for a quick one-off joke and that guy out-acts the whole cast.

The only thing I liked was the theme song and that was just the original. It would have been SO EASY and SO AWESOME to make a Rob Zombie version of the theme song, and he couldn't even do that?


throwing in mine:

Scarecrow and Mrs. King
McMillan and Wife
McCloud
Columbo
Remington Steele

* Count Orlok, if you're nasty
posted by mmoncur at 4:55 PM on July 13, 2022 [4 favorites]

NOOO THANK YOU!!
posted by robbyrobs at 4:59 PM on July 13, 2022

There was one episode of The Munsters that moved me. IIRC, Herman thought he had a child. "My boy!" But it was just a toy. Decades later, that still hurts.
posted by SPrintF at 4:59 PM on July 13, 2022 [4 favorites]

The problem The Munsters has that is in the last few years its turf has been comprehensively gazumped by the billion-dollar Hotel Transylvania franchise, which plays a similar "Oh hey, all the Universal Monsters are in the public domain!" vibe but which is much bigger and more mainstream than the Munsters ever was. (One could argue that the recent animated Addams Family movie was also an attempt to claw back some of that turf, or at least some of those dollars, from HotTrans.) That's what this movie is up against, and I think it's trying to be a live-action cartoon, or at least its trailer is trying to sell it as that. Best of luck to it.
posted by Hogshead at 5:01 PM on July 13, 2022 [2 favorites]

Rob Zombie has never been a particularly good director (although he's had some moments of pretty good stuff in otherwise uneven films, like Lords of Salem had its moments), but this looks like utter, complete dogshit. Absolutely none of the jokes land, and visually it looks like 90s TV comedy-horror a la Sabrina the Teenage Witch.

However, as I posted in a Facebook comment, the objectively absolutely worst thing about this is the black and white studio logo intro in the beginning, with the visible perforations. The perforations are moving all over the place, while the image is perfectly stable otherwise. How, exactly, does the person making this think film perforations work? If they were moving like that, the image would be at least as big a blurry mess (probably slightly more, since there's gate weave in the camera too). And while I could tolerate how shitty the rest of this looks, that's the last straw, I will definitely not be watching this, because of that.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 5:10 PM on July 13, 2022 [12 favorites]

Count Orlok, if you're nasty

I am nasty, so: One.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 5:11 PM on July 13, 2022 [4 favorites]

I would def go see a Moonlighting-reboot movie. It might be the only series in the 80s that I watched more or less regularly. The youngsters have no idea Bruce Willis used to be good.
posted by morspin at 5:13 PM on July 13, 2022 [8 favorites]

a vampire and a frankenstein, I bet they have wacky cartoony adventures!

According to federal statute, if you say "a frankenstein", you also have to say "a dracula", no "vampire" allowed.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 5:16 PM on July 13, 2022 [18 favorites]

Shit pitch: M*A*S*H but set in 2003 in Kuwait
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 5:20 PM on July 13, 2022 [6 favorites]

The audio mix sounds unfinished, and audiences are really turned off by cruddy audio, they'll have to fix that. If they do, then audiences can forgive some cheapness if it's funny. I'd watch this if it was on TV late at night and had clever dialogue. Could even work as a new TV series more than just a feature film.
posted by ovvl at 5:22 PM on July 13, 2022

HotTrans

Uh, please never, ever refer to Hotel Transylvania as "HotTrans." Just... don't.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 5:28 PM on July 13, 2022 [20 favorites]

kirkaracha: "The original Addams Family movie trailer is approximately 1,000 times better in every way."

Watching that trailer gives me a little more hope for this movie. It was also just a bunch of quippy one-liners that could easily fall flat, and I know that film was actually fun. It really just might be the sound and editing of this trailer that makes it so totally meh. It could still work.
posted by team lowkey at 5:28 PM on July 13, 2022

Shit pitch: Columbo, but Columbo is played by a Yeti.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 5:29 PM on July 13, 2022 [5 favorites]

"Just one more thing... Rowr!"
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 5:31 PM on July 13, 2022 [3 favorites]

I don’t think this is for me, but the visual style and weird timing are familiar from the couple of Rob Zombie movies I’ve seen. I think that’s just his thing, and this is what it turns out like minus the body count.
posted by threecheesetrees at 5:33 PM on July 13, 2022 [1 favorite]

I checked imdb and confirmed that Richard Brake is in it, so that's something. (He's playing someone called Dr. Henry Augustus Wolfgang.)
posted by paper chromatographologist at 5:52 PM on July 13, 2022 [1 favorite]

Shit pitch: M*A*S*H but set in 2003 in Kuwait
I'd totally watch that, same with a Scarecrow and Mrs. King reboot
posted by Dr. Twist at 5:59 PM on July 13, 2022 [1 favorite]

Shit pitch: Columbo, but Columbo is played by a Yeti.

Mark Ruffalo obvsly
posted by ricochet biscuit at 5:59 PM on July 13, 2022 [7 favorites]

I'm calling it here: this looks the way it does because it's lulling you in to a false sense of complacency before springing a hard-R horror twist at some point in the second act.
posted by saladin at 6:02 PM on July 13, 2022 [8 favorites]

This looks like a porn parody.

It really, really does, and this is maybe one of the only trailers I've ever said "What? No." and just stopped watching halfway through.
posted by Ghidorah at 6:06 PM on July 13, 2022

a hard-R horror twist at some point in the second act

That's when they introduce Marilyn Munster, who turns out to be a serial killer. She slaughters everyone.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 6:11 PM on July 13, 2022 [3 favorites]

Columbo
Mark Ruffalo obvsly

I think you mean Natasha Lyonne.
posted by dobbs at 6:36 PM on July 13, 2022 [21 favorites]

Agreed. The mustache is unacceptable.

It is not a MAYBEstache, it is a MUSTache.

I loved the Munsters growing up. Al Lewis* was my favorite. This looks like crap. Maybe because I am near 60? Not sure who the target audience is or why the need to remake The Munsters, but good luck to them who financed this flick.

As for Hogan's Heroes, loved it. Just finished watching all 6 seasons. MeTV, two episodes a night.

* Al Lewis was a basketball savant. Later in life, he had a newsletter ranking HS basketball players for recruiters for college. He would show up at playgrounds in NYC to watch games on weekends. I saw him once at the playground on W 4th Street.
posted by JohnnyGunn at 6:47 PM on July 13, 2022 [6 favorites]

I'm hoping that the awfulness of this is the point and that there's some sort of deliberate fuckery going on what with the emphasis on Rob Zombie's previous films. The earlier teaser trailer said the movie is rated PG, so I'm not expecting a Marilyn-the-serial-killer like twist, but I am still expecting (hoping for?) a twist. But who knows, maybe this is exactly what it says on the tin and it's just a weird passion project from a director who can get away with being so oblivious to the quality of their own work.

We could have had Mockingbird Lane, but instead we get...this.

This is a show about a frankenstein who's married to a dracula and they have werewolf son.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 7:14 PM on July 13, 2022 [1 favorite]

I remember Al Lewis from his appearances on Furniture To Go.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 7:21 PM on July 13, 2022 [2 favorites]

Addams Family 1991 cast: Anjelica Huston, Raul Julia, Christopher Lloyd, Christina Ricci, Carol Kane

that's some serious acting chops for 1991 with Ricci being the least known..

there's no comparison other than the source material.
posted by djseafood at 7:35 PM on July 13, 2022 [6 favorites]

I don't know if I trust someone who doesn't know the difference between the Koach and the Dragula to do anything with the Munsters.

On a serious note, it's got some deliberate stylistic choices. They're not the ones I would make. But I was never a huge fan of the original Munsters anyway. I don't expect this to go anywhere. I do expect it to be a lot more fun than when Universal tried to set up that monster shared universe. But that's damning with really faint praise.
posted by Hactar at 8:52 PM on July 13, 2022 [5 favorites]

The Addams Family movies didn’t make a point of trying to get everybody hooked with the plots, not that they did a poor job of that, but they knew what kind of movies they were making. They made movies that were, first and foremost, a lot of fun. They didn’t lose sight of this, and they filmed it very well to boot. Gomez and Morticia had such a perfect chemistry, a credit to Raul Julia and Angelica Huston. The characters and their love for each other felt genuine. The children, Fester, and Lurch were all capable of holding their own in scenes very well. (The Thanksgiving play in Addams Family Values is one of my favorite movie scenes ever.)

This is where I have concerns for the quality of this movie. The performances look… well, they look like something, I suppose. The chemistry of the characters looks really clumsy and not in a funny way. The production values are just entirely off. There might be some stylistic decisions, but you want them to stand on their own and not be distracting. The original TV series looks better produced than what we’re seeing on this trailer.

So, best of luck to Rob Zombie on this. Maybe we get pleasantly surprised. But I don’t know that I’m holding out hope.
posted by azpenguin at 9:42 PM on July 13, 2022 [3 favorites]

The very young version of me who enjoyed the original silly show doesn't like that Grandpa doesn't seem to like Herman Munster in this trailer. He was sarcastic, but loveable. I don't think he was never hateful.
posted by eye of newt at 10:08 PM on July 13, 2022 [6 favorites]

"I had higher expectations of Rob Zombie" is not a thought I ever imagined it was possible to have
posted by anazgnos at 10:24 PM on July 13, 2022 [23 favorites]

The Addams Family '91 movie works because it has a basically miraculous cast.

Silly as it sounds, the "extended Mamushka cut" really rights a wrong. The movie is first and foremost about just letting that radiant cast radiate and they cut the heart out of their biggest production number
posted by anazgnos at 10:42 PM on July 13, 2022 [6 favorites]

Hot Take - the central comic conceit of The Munsters was "immigrant family can't quite understand American culture." A 21st century remake that focused on seeing the United States through the eyes of "frightening immigrants" could be subversively hilarious. A 21st century remake focusing on "ugly" niece Marilyn and how she struggles to navigate balancing the cultural traditions of "Transylvania" with her American identity could be fascinating and hilarious. Even a straight up parody of American family and workplace TV tropes in the 21st century (which is kind of what the original series was) has potential.

Based on this trailer, I'm not sure that Zombie's take (which appears to be "let's insert the Munsters into 60's/70's pop music culture because Herman as Sony Bono could be funny") is true to the source material on more than a surface level. As such, I'm have grave (sic) doubts about this film.
posted by Joey Michaels at 11:55 PM on July 13, 2022 [3 favorites]

Perhaps this is one of those movies that get made to extend copyright holding - it would explain why an entire film has been made, but zero effort has been put into post-production
posted by The River Ivel at 1:58 AM on July 14, 2022 [2 favorites]

Mr. Zombie, you can have my idea for a different take on this concept for free:

Taking the "Ugly niece Marilyn" idea to the extreme, the entire Munster family looks perfectly normal, except for superficially resembling their TV counterparts. Halfway through the film they venture outside the house, worried about how they will be seen, and we realize they are living in a world where everyone except them are vampires and werewolves and Frankenstein's monsters.
posted by mmoncur at 2:44 AM on July 14, 2022 [2 favorites]

It looped back around for me, maybe a result of reading these comments? The style/production/camp is intentional and as Kitteh said, he's going for something. It might not work, but it doesn't look like it'll be boring.
posted by clinthowarth at 4:46 AM on July 14, 2022 [3 favorites]

Why does it look like the actors were standing in front of a green screen for every shot? Was this all made in his bathroom?
posted by kittens for breakfast at 5:19 AM on July 14, 2022 [4 favorites]

This is a show about a frankenstein who's married to a dracula and they have werewolf son.

I expect Dalton Wilcox to be particularly upset about this movie.

Myself, I thought it was a bad idea from the start because, although I was never a fan of the Munsters (are there such things? for shows you just remember watching in reruns on a hot day?), I did think that its grace was that it had heart. That is ... not a known quantity of Mr. Zombie's films.
posted by Countess Elena at 6:19 AM on July 14, 2022 [4 favorites]

Adapted from the popular television series the film stars Jeff Daniel Phillips, Sheri Zombie Moon and Daniel Roebuck amongst others.

I watched the trailer having misread that first name as Jeff Daniels, and thought, “Well, we’re a long way from the Sorkin gig, aren’t we?”
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:38 AM on July 14, 2022 [2 favorites]

and the woman playing Lily seems to be overacting.

That's Sheri Moon Zombie, Rob's wife, who automatically gets the lead female role in his movies. Like I would be very surprised if they even perfunctorily auditioned anyone else. Works out okay sometimes (she was quite good in Lords of Salem), this...not so much (based on this trailer anyway).
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 7:05 AM on July 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

"extended Mamushka cut"

I think I actually stopped breathing when that dance sequence got going.
posted by ovvl at 7:10 AM on July 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

This trailer has the same "homemade low budget TV show" look and feel of his other movies. What surprised me about that is this is a big studio film. There was a fair amount of Twitter controversy recently about a video where Taika Waititi makes fun of the VFX in the new Thor movie -- which he directed -- in a way that made me wonder if he had even seen the film with his name on it before it was released to theaters. One gets the impression that MCU movies are orchestrated by directors, but directed by Disney. And yet it is extraordinarily plain to me that every part of this film was made by Rob Zombie, perhaps after Universal simply gave up and went home.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 7:20 AM on July 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

I thought you all were talking about the recent Addams Family cartoon remakes, not the one from 1991. Those are so-so at best.
posted by The_Vegetables at 7:46 AM on July 14, 2022

Leaving from a theater near you...
posted by aeshnid at 8:11 AM on July 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

I don't know if I trust someone who doesn't know the difference between the Koach and the Dragula to do anything with the Munsters.

Is there a word for being amazingly entertained by someone sharing their extremely specific domain knowledge of a subject you don't personally know anything about, don't really care anything about, and are totally unaffected by the lack of knowledge before you read about it? But you do read it, and now you know it well enough to recall it, and it probably crowds out something more important and that you previously cared more about?


Whatever that word is, reading that Munster car article just did it to me.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:26 AM on July 14, 2022 [8 favorites]

I watched the trailer having misread that first name as Jeff Daniels, and thought, “Well, we’re a long way from the Sorkin gig, aren’t we?”

Yeah. The Newsroom was much worse than this.
posted by Atom Eyes at 8:39 AM on July 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

I thought you all were talking about the recent Addams Family cartoon remakes, not the one from 1991. Those are so-so at best.

That's pretty much why I was a bit excited about the earlier teaser. The Munsters was never as good as the original Addams Family, but if a new Munsters outing just happens to be better than the recent Addams Family reboots...

Netflix has a Tim Burton-helmed Wednesday Addams series coming out soon which I'm not too excited about mostly because Tim Burton. I worry it's going to be more along the lines of Mockingbird Lane than either of the Addams Family films or the original tv series.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 9:08 AM on July 14, 2022

Bosom Buddies [trigger warning: beefcake]
Simon & Simon
Hart to Hart
posted by kirkaracha at 9:18 AM on July 14, 2022 [2 favorites]

I hate to be That Guy, because I find Those Guys to be tiresome, but... I'm not sure that it can be properly done without Fred Gwynne, who was so gloriously hammy that he might actually be Jon Hamm's dad. I'm trying to think of who might possibly be able to pull it off, and the best that I can come up with is Pat Kilbane (formerly of MADtv). This thing comes off as Rob Zombie trying to be W*A*C*K*Y and not quite pulling it off. (Ironically, Kilbane played Zombie in this MADtv sketch about Randy Newman doing Star Wars songs.)
posted by Halloween Jack at 9:25 AM on July 14, 2022 [4 favorites]

My second suggestion: throw away everything that was shot for the trailer (although leave the trailer as is) and shoot a Gus-Van-Zantesque shot-for-shot remake of Munster, Go Home!. See how long it takes for anyone to notice. Because anyone who saw that movie is probably either dead or was 5 years old (yes, lots of grandparents at the theater when I saw it, including mine).

Also my oblig mention that Yvonne de Carlo was born in Vancouver BC.
posted by morspin at 10:08 AM on July 14, 2022 [2 favorites]

HotTrans

Uh, please never, ever refer to Hotel Transylvania as "HotTrans." Just... don't.

Rocky Horror?
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 10:43 AM on July 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

Hogan's Heroes but it's set in 2000s Guantanamo Bay.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 10:46 AM on July 14, 2022 [5 favorites]

Gilligan's Island, but in space. The 4-hour LEO flight goes very wrong.
posted by jquinby at 11:01 AM on July 14, 2022 [6 favorites]

I like the theme song. So I guess there's that.
posted by mazola at 11:28 AM on July 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

Whoa. This trailer is so...tangible. And some serious recursiveness is emerging here re: the ritual of re-animating a corpse and making a spectacle out of it.
posted by Bob Regular at 11:28 AM on July 14, 2022 [4 favorites]

Hmmm.

Kolchak: The Night Stalker
The Rockford Files

And digging real deep here:

Salvage 1
(Andy Griffith as a junk yard owner that builds a rocket that looks just like Blue Origin)

ARK II
posted by chromecow at 11:36 AM on July 14, 2022 [5 favorites]

Taking the "Ugly niece Marilyn" idea to the extreme, the entire Munster family looks perfectly normal, except for superficially resembling their TV counterparts. Halfway through the film they venture outside the house, worried about how they will be seen, and we realize they are living in a world where everyone except them are vampires and werewolves and Frankenstein's monsters.

Jerry: I'm not buying any of this.
Kramer: All right, so what are you saying? That we're wrong? Oh, everybody's wrong but you.
Jerry: You know, this is like that Twilight Zone where the guy wakes up, and he's the same but everyone else is different!
Kramer: Which one?
Jerry: They were all like that.
posted by condour75 at 11:37 AM on July 14, 2022 [2 favorites]

Gilligan's Island, but in space. The 4-hour LEO flight goes very wrong.

If you didn't know about this, you need to know about this.
posted by condour75 at 11:38 AM on July 14, 2022 [14 favorites]

If you didn't know about this, you need to know about this.

I keep coming back to Metafilter because it's the kind of place where multiple people have heard of Gilligan's Planet.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 12:12 PM on July 14, 2022 [17 favorites]

(formerly of MADtv)

Funny, I was thinking that this trailer looks like a mash-up of MADtv reject sketches.
posted by Saxon Kane at 12:39 PM on July 14, 2022 [2 favorites]

I heard "Rob Zombie is directing a Munsters movie" and thought Well, sure, that not only makes sense but will most likely be better than it has any reason to be and now I am reconsidering many, many priors.

See I had the exact opposite impression. Munsters is all about sweet and wholesome, while appearing on the surface spooky. Rob Zombie is never wholesome, it's all fuckin and killing suckin mucky muck shit. There's a time and place for that, like in a disgusting horror movie, but lmao Munsters and Rob Zombie cannot mix.
posted by GoblinHoney at 2:10 PM on July 14, 2022 [4 favorites]

Kirkaracha: Now I want to watch HD reruns of Hart to Hart. My mom loved that show, I'd sometimes watch it with her. I could see it as campy and silly enough to hold up and be worth watching again.
posted by SoberHighland at 3:22 PM on July 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

I guess here’s as good a place as any to drop my theory that half or more of Rob Zombie’s creative output started out as covers of “Jesus Built My Hotrod.”
posted by Mister Moofoo at 4:26 PM on July 14, 2022 [8 favorites]

There are a couple "Wizard of Oz" callbacks in the trailer, Grampa is played by The Doorman and, of course, the Wicked Witch of the West.
posted by Floydd at 5:41 PM on July 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

Now I want to watch HD reruns of Hart to Hart

My wife absolutely loves that show, she found a local channel that ran it (when we lived in Germany, of all places) and got hooked. If you have cable, Ovation frequently shows old episodes.
posted by photo guy at 6:52 PM on July 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

This completely lacks the charm, sincerity, and sweetness of the original series. The Scooby Doo live action remakes are 100x better, and that's saying something.
posted by The Adventure Begins at 1:51 AM on July 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

I keep coming back to Metafilter because it's the kind of place where multiple people have heard of Gilligan's Planet.

My problem is that I keep mixing it up with Far Out Space Nuts!
posted by Naberius at 8:39 AM on July 16, 2022 [2 favorites]

Red Letter Media Talks About the Munsters Trailer For Some Reason.
posted by Pendragon at 9:46 AM on July 25, 2022

I'd assumed this was going out to theaters, but that RLM video made it sound like a little cheapo thing that's going straight to streaming. I checked out Zombie's filmography on Wikipedia, and jeez, I had no idea how far his stock had fallen in Hollywood.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 1:33 AM on July 26, 2022