Black Hole Tagged Articles at Cinematical

So before anyone accuses me of pandering to celebrity by putting a picture of Brad Pitt on this news item, I want you to know that I tried to find a picture that was a little more 'newsworthy', but caved when I came up with nothing. So, it's Pitt you get. The Hollywood Reporter announced that Pitt's production company, Plan B, have purchased the rights to the true life tale of local journalist Linda Trest, and her take-down of a conman posing as a federal agent in Gerald, Missouri.

Anthony Walton and Andrew Dresher have already been tapped to write the story of a small town journalist by the name of Linda Trest who had been receiving complaints about drug searches that had been conducted by Bill A. Jakob (a new-to-town federal agent who had supposedly been sent to handle the town's Methamphetamine problem). After conducting her own investigation, Trest uncovered that Jakob was an unemployed former trucking company owner, a former security guard, a former wedding minister and a former small-town cop -- one thing he wasn't was a federal agent. Jakob eventually pleaded guilty to impersonating an officer, and is facing six years in prison.

Plan B has been snatching up new properties left and right lately, including Eat, Pray, Love, with Ryan Murphy directing, The Killer and Black Hole with David Fincher, and the just-announced Battling Boy. Like with most Plan B projects, rumors are already brewing over whether or not Pitt will star (presumably as Jakob). But as we all know, Pitt has the bad habit of dropping out of movies even after signing on the dotted line, so we'll have to wait and see.

It's a sad day when an anticipated adaptation loses a pair of talented scriptwriters -- and that day has dawned. Neil Gaiman told MTV that he and co-writer Roger Avary are no longer attached to Black Hole, the big-screen adaptation of Charles Burns' terrifying graphic novel. (You can check out a preview of it here on Pantheon's official site.)

They've been working on the project for two years. Originally, Alexandre Aja was set to direct, but then David Fincher claimed it as his own. And that's when Gaiman and Avary stepped aside. "Once they got David Fincher on, David explained his process consisted of having over ten drafts, done over and over, and Roger and I were sort of asked if we wanted to, if we were interested in doing that. And we definitely weren't."

Fincher is a notoriously demanding director (Robert Downey Jr. once compared working with him to being in a gulag), but no one can question the results. Then again, after spending two years on the script, the prospect of writing ten more drafts can hardly be appealing. If nothing else, Gaiman and Avary's work might stick around -- Gaiman says they left the last draft with Fincher, though he's unsure what will happen to it. "So we'll wait and see what happens. I just hope whatever happens, it's faithful to Black Hole." I think the graphic novel remains in good hands. The tone of the book seems a walk in the park for Fincher. And how far can a story about sexually transmitted mutations stray, really?

Any time I hear news about a new project from director David Fincher, I get a little excited. Barring his debut, the studio-monkeyed Alien 3, Fincher has had a remarkably impressive run as a flick helmer: Seven, The Game, Fight Club, Panic Room and Zodiac, with The Curious Case of Benjamin Button on the way. So even though he already has a few projects in development, Mr. Fincher has signed on to direct an adaptation of Charles Burns' graphic novel Black Hole. Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary, who last collaborated on Beowulf, will bang out the screenplay for MTV Films and Paramount Pictures.

The Hollywood Reporter offers this as a plot synopsis: "The story follows a group of high school students whose lives are altered drastically when they come in contact with a sexually transmitted disease called the "teen plague" or "the bug." But if you head on over to the publisher's site, you'll find a much more thorough breakdown. To me it sounds like John Hughes meets (early) David Cronenberg ... and obviously that'd be just fine by me. Here's hoping Fincher makes Black Hole his very next project.

Black Hole is a comic book series that was published by Charles Burns over the course of about a decade. Collected in a widely-praised graphic novel last year, the series explores "fear of adulthood, sex and ostracism" via a story about a horrible, sexually transmitted disease known as "the bug" that leaves teens with symptoms ranging from "a rash or a few bumps" to extreme disfigurement. According to Publishers Weekly, "The AIDS metaphor is obvious, but the bug also amplifies already existing teen emotions and the wrenching changes of puberty." Ah. So you're saying it's sort of a harrowing read, then?

Burns' incredibly intense work has been optioned by Paramount and MTV Films, who have hired Neil Gaiman - no stranger to graphic novels - and Roger Avary to adapt it for the screen; the pair previously worked together on the screenplay for Robert Zemeckis' upcoming Beowulf. Directing the film will be Frenchman Alexandre Aja, whose remake of The Hills Have Eyes opens this weekend. Aja is about to head into production on The Waiting; it's expected that work on Black Hole will begin as soon as that film wraps.