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Ever since he came to Danny Boyle's attention by writing the source material for the filmmaker's "The Beach," novelist-turned-screenwriter Alex Garland has been carving out a neat little niche for himself as the writer of some unusually thoughtful science fiction projects. From his collaborations with Boyle on "28 Days Later" and "Sunshine" to the recently-released "Never Let Me Go," Garland's lent a fresh take to familiar tropes, even if in the first two cases he wasn't able to escape the trappings of the genre, and the films tended to fall apart in the final act.
He's got comic book adaptation "Dredd," with Karl Urban and Olivia Thirlby, shooting imminently, and Garland talked to Worst Previews in support of Mark Romanek's film, and gave some updates on a trio of projects that he's been linked to. While we reported on his skepticism regarding a possible third film in the "28 Days Later" series yesterday, he's slightly more positive on the remake of "Logan's Run," which he was reported to be circling earlier in the year.
Garland relates "I've been talking to a guy called Carl Rinsch and Warner Bros about making it into a film. I have a slightly uneasy feeling [about] that because I'm now the go-to screenwriter for people who have short lives." Rinsch is the commercials director who was briefly in the director's chair for the "Alien" prequels, before being replaced by his mentor (and father-in-law) Ridley Scott. It's not all bad for Rinsch though -- his short film "The Gift" made waves earlier this year, and he's gearing up to shoot "47 Ronin" with Keanu Reeves in the near future.
It sounds like things aren't much further along on "Logan's Run" than they were in July -- partly because both Garland and Rinsch have more pressing concerns, we imagine -- but it seems likely that the project will move forward down the line.
Garland was also the first writer on board the adaptation of the video game "Halo," but despite recent movement on that, and reports that Garland's script, along with three others, were being used as a blueprint, the writer no longer seems to be involved: "I wrote a screenplay for that a long, long time ago. I have no idea what's happening. I was contracted to write one draft of the screenplay. That was it. [That was] eight years ago." So if it does happen, it seems that Garland's involvement will be minimal -- particularly with Dreamworks allegedly using spin-off novels as source material for their version to avoid legal issues with earlier scripts based on the game.
If it seems like the "Halo" movie has been kicking around Hollywood forever, well, it kind of has. Let's rewind a bit shall we?
Five years ago, Columbia Pictures president Peter Schlessel first got the ball rolling on the adaptation of the hit video game when he began development of the project outside of the studio system to avoid hitting the usual snags these kind of projects run into. He got Alex Garland ("28 Days Later," "Never Let Me Go") to pen the the screenplay, earning him a $1 million check courtesy of Microsoft.
The script was then sent out to the major studios with a major price tag: $10 million against 15 percent of the grosses. It was a very tough sell but eventually Fox and Universal decided to partner on the project and split the cost -- $5 million each -- but bargained down the gross percentage to 10. Things continued to move forward with Peter Jackson and his team being brought on board to produce with Neill Blomkamp directing. However, Jackson and co. also snagged a lucrative first dollar percentage gross deal and suddenly, Fox executives were not happy at the rising cost of production versus the increasingly small piece of the pie they would be getting in return. They eventually demanded Jackson and co. cut back their deals, but predictably, they walked away from the project.
Of course, this move pissed off Universal who were already in the red having spent $12 million on the project and they took Fox to court. While things were settled out of court, the rumor is that Universal pretty much got hosed and were left holding the bag.
Despite that messy history, DreamWorks are going to take a stab at bringing the game to the big screen but instead of the actual video game for their adaptation, they will be basing their movie off the novelizations that only super dorks read. Why? For the simple reason to keep Universal lawyers from demanding from DreamWorks the $12 million they spent on development. If they try it, DreamWorks can say, "Hey, we're using different source material, it's a different movie, you're not getting a red cent."
That said, Microsoft themselves may end up standing in the way of the the film anyway. They are very, very cautious about their moneymaker franchise getting fucked up in another medium. In short, it will take a hell of a lot of convincing for them to agree to get on board. But that said, if DreamWorks is willing to spend the money, and can get the right key talent involved, we can see them convincing Microsoft to come aboard for what will ultimately be the best commercial for the game they've ever had.
And this isn't the first time DreamWorks has been linked to the film. Last year, rumors surfaced that Steven Spielberg would be directing the film and while it remains to be seen if he'll end up taking the job, you can bet he will be reading every script that comes into the DreamWorks offices. [NY Mag]
Ever since he came to Danny Boyle's attention by writing the source material for the filmmaker's "The Beach," novelist-turned-screenwriter Alex Garland has been carving out a neat little niche for himself as the writer of some unusually thoughtful science fiction projects. From his collaborations with Boyle on "28 Days Later" and "Sunshine" to the recently-released "Never Let Me Go," Garland's lent a fresh take to familiar tropes, even if in the first two cases he wasn't able to escape the trappings of the genre, and the films tended to fall apart in the final act.
