fahrenheit451 Tagged Articles at Cinematical

A new adaptation (I refuse to use the word remake here) of Fahrenheit 451 has been in the works for ten years now. I was very excited by the news that Mel Gibson was planning it as a Braveheart follow-up, as it seemed like that would mark a new and serious phase of his directing career. I wish that was something I could have been right about.

Frank Darabont was the next one to take it on, and he's been attached to it since 2001, rewriting Terry Hayes' script and being delayed by everything from Indiana Jones IV, Mission Impossible III, The Mist, and Law Abiding Citizen. SciFi Wire caught up with Darabont at the Saturn Awards, and the director / writer declared that it was really time to get on with it already ... and that it might actually get underway this time, depending on whether or not the Big Name Actor he wants signs on.

"Fahrenheit is the thing I'm trying to get up next, which is casting-dependent, so it's one of those. I'm out to somebody at the moment, fingers crossed, because, boy, do I want to make that movie. I'm not giving up. I'll die in the traces before I don't make that movie ... It's not one of those movies that are vastly expensive by any contemporary standard, but money is still money, and it's of a price that requires somebody that will justify that investment. This is definitely going to be more than The Mist, so those other considerations do come into play."

You can go crazy wondering just who that Big Actor who can pull in the money and box office might be. Could it be someone that rumors have long attached, like Tom Hanks (Darabont's pick for years), Brad Pitt, or Tom Cruise? Or could we be looking at someone newly bankable, like Johnny Depp?

I remember reading Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 back in high school, and while those years have slowly disappeared in a cloud of smoke, I vaguely remember liking it ... a lot. AICN is reporting this morning that Frank Darabont (the man assigned to both write and direct the big-screen adaptation of Fahrenheit 451) wants none other than Tom Hanks for the lead role. Now, the funniest thing about this whole thing is that Cinematical received the same tip -- from the same dude -- earlier this month. In his email, he claimed that his "stepson's dad is a senior Hollywood technical guy, whose buds are on Frank Darabont's The Mist." The tipster's email to us continued with: "They say FARENHEIT 451 is a go, and that Darabont has landed his GREEN MILE lead for the same here. Tom Hanks will be Guy Montag."

We know it's the same tipster because, in his email, he mentions the fact that he passed this along to Harry Knowles awhile ago, but Knowles never did anything with it. Well, today, the guys over at AICN finally pulled this one out of their closet. I came close to reporting on this before, but I'm always skeptical of tips when I don't know the person handing it over. So make of this what you will; perhaps AICN knows for a fact that this is official, and so they're finally posting it now. Either that, or they're just cycling through their old tips searching for new news. Regardless, Hanks seems like a good choice. If it goes down, he'll be playing the lead, Guy Montag; a "fireman" whose job it is to go around, burning books and the houses that store them, while prosecuting those who own them. The story is set in a warped kind of future where books have been completely replaced by interactive entertainment. When Montag begins to question a society that would want to destroy books, his life -- and the lives of those around him -- become threatened. We'll keep you posted when (and if) we hear more.

In a new interview at MTV.com, Frank Darabont talks The Mist, future projects, and the "tremendous disappointment" of having his Indiana Jones 4 script rejected by George Lucas. Darabont has directed what I would consider to be one classic movie (The Shawshank Redemption), one very good movie (The Green Mile) and one well-intentioned, but pretty weak movie (The Majestic). I'm hoping getting back to the Stephen King adaptations with The Mist puts him right back on the exceptional path he started on years ago. Darabont is using the guys who did the CGI work in Pan's Labyrinth for the monsters in The Mist, and he thinks the film is "too intense" for anything but an "R" rating. He claims to have been influenced by the style of 28 Days Later, but don't expect to find anything as graphic as scenes found in Saw or Hostel. Darabont says: "The torture-porn thing is pretty distasteful. I'm just not into it. Horror unfortunately tends to go in these cycles where it puts itself back in this ghetto. I just don't find anything amusing about people getting tortured. I wish we weren't making these movies. I think it degrades the culture. I think it diminishes the human spirit."

Darabont also discusses his experience as a writer-for-hire on Indiana Jones 4, calling it "a waste of a year." He says it "showed me how badly things can go. I spent a year of very determined effort on something I was very excited about, working very closely with Steven Spielberg and coming up with a result that I and he felt was terrific. He wanted to direct it as his next movie, and then suddenly the whole thing goes down in flames because George Lucas doesn't like the script." Darabont is a pretty powerful guy in his own right, and says he had no problem accosting Lucas about the matter. "I told him he was crazy. I said, "You have a fantastic script. I think you're insane, George." You can say things like that to George, and he doesn't even blink. He's one of the most stubborn men I know." Darabont doesn't know if any of his original work will make it into the film, but might his Indy script ever be seen by all the interested fans? Says Darabont: "I would love it, but it's not my material to disseminate. At this point, I don't give much of a damn what George thinks, but I wouldn't want to harm my friendship with Steven."

Darabont is hoping his next movie will be an adaptation of Ray Bradbury's classic Fahrenheit 451. The Mist finished shooting last week, and is expected to be in theaters this November.