10 Horror Movie Directors That Quit The Genre
2. Breck Eisner (The Crazies)
Infamous amongst film fans for a time in the mid noughties, mostly because his costly flop Sahara turned out to be (allegedly) involved in all sorts of dodgy money shuffling behind the scenes, Breck Eisner spent a few years as a Hollywood persona non grata.
However the 2005 Clive Cussler adaptation's disastrous reception didn't follow him forever, and by 2010 the filmmaker was entrusted with a more modest budget to remake Night of the Living Dead director George A Romero's underrated 1973 pandemic sci-fi horror The Crazies.
A sort-of proto 28 Days Later which positioned an out-of-control military as a foe just as dangerous as the titular zombies, the original film is a slice of paranoid anti-establishment sci-fi satire. After all the (alleged) government-bribing involved in the making of Sahara Eisner was perfectly suited to the story of a corrupt government, and his 2010 re-do more than did justice to the original movie.
Propulsive, intense, and surprisingly thoughtful, the bleak film was one of the first post 9/11 American horror flicks to depict the military as a dangerous, corrupt force, and it was all the more effective for it.
So of course, Eisner learned his lesson, and his next film was... 2015 fantasy flop The Last Witch Hunter.