Jim Carrey is returning to horror — with one of the big wigs of the genre, no less. The actor, who proved utterly creepy in 2007’s The Number 23, is teaming up with Eli Roth for Aleister Arcane, a movie adaptation of the horror comic by Steve Niles.
Carrey will executive produce and star in the movie, which is about a group of children who befriend an old man who’s been ruined and shunned by their parents. The man dies but not before laying a curse on the town that only the kids have the power to break. The comic, published in 2004, saw this old man as Aleister Green who moonlights as a late-night horror TV host called Aleister Arcane in Jackson, Oklahoma. It’s the town that forces him off the air, leading to this revenge plot.
Variety was the first to report the news of Carrey’s involvement. While the trade doesn’t state which role Carrey will take, it’s more than likely that of the titular old man. The film is another long-gestating project, but Roth will direct the picture for Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment company. David Hoberman, Todd Lieberman, and Michael Aguilar will also produce.
Though more psychological thriller than horror, The Number 23 saw Carrey as a man convinced a book he was reading was somehow modeled after his life. He proceeds to fall down a dark and dangerous hole into the depths of a paranoid state, showing off another facet to the longtime comedic actor. Carrey also famously featured in The Cable Guy, another non-horror movie with a creepy character, one who stalked and became obsessed with his new “friend.”
Carrey’s latest roles in Dumb and Dumber To, Anchorman 2, and Kick-Ass 2 (see the pattern?), so a tale from the mind of Roth, who helmed the bloody Green Inferno and produced the equally gory Hemlock Grove, is an interesting new pace.
