Bodega Bay

Wearing his producer hat, director Michael Bay (Armageddon) has overseen recent remakes of such venerable low-budget horror movies as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Amityville Horror, but now, he's going after a prestige project: a remake of Alfred Hitchchock's The Birds. According to the Hollywood Reporter, Bay is in talks to produce the Universal remake. The new movie would return to the Daphne Du Maurier short story that was the source of Hitchcock's 1963 film, in which thousands of birds mysteriously attack the residents of the seaside California town of Bodega Bay.

Hitchcock remakes have become increasingly common in recent years, with Gus Van Sant's shot-for-shot remake of Psycho, Christopher Reeve's TV version of Rear Window, and the Michael Douglas-Gwyneth Paltrow film A Perfect Murder, an update of Dial M for Murder. According to the Reporter, Warner Bros. is developing a new version of Strangers on a Train. Note to Hollywood: Keep your paws off Vertigo; you'll only mess it up.