David Lowery

It’s been decades since I saw the original Pete’s Dragon, but from what I remember, I don’t get a lot of it in this trailer for David Lowery’s remake of the 1977 Disney film. Instead, it feels a lot more like The Iron Giant mixed with E.T., How to Train Your Dragon, and even the recent live-action Jungle Book directed by Jon Favreau. There’s not much in the way of wacky mischief and wild antics from an invisible dragon, and much more wonder and melancholy about the tender relationship between a boy and his amazing dragon, and the close-minded adults who want to destroy him.

Surprise! (Not really.) Disney is developing yet another live-action remake of one of their classic animated properties, this time setting their sights on Peter Pan — which sort of feels like a real shots-fired situation following the failure of Joe Wright’s Pan over at Warner Bros. David Lowery, who recently helmed the Pete’s Dragon remake for Disney, has been tapped to direct and script a new live-action Peter Pan movie.

When last we saw Pete’s Dragon he (and it) looked like this:

The first official teaser for Disney's remake of Pete's Dragon arrives on Sunday evening, but you can catch a glimpse of the friendly new dragon with a new poster and motion poster for the upcoming film. You can't see the big green guy's face, but these posters do give us a sense of where Disney and director David Lowery are heading with their reimagining of the 1977 fantasy classic.

David Lowery, whose 'Ain't Them Bodies Saints' was a hit at this year's Sundance film festival, is the latest director attached to direct an adaptation of Brian Michael Bendis' graphic novel, 'Torso.'

At this point, it's fair to say cinema is going through reboot culture phase. So many of the big tentpoles films are now about either continuing a franchise or starting over to tell those stories again in a slightly different way. The latest example of this is Walt Disney's 'Pete's Dragon,' which is currently being reworked for a modern interpretation.