We’re flirting with a year since Eric blasted a briefing about Max Barry’s online-serial MACHINE MAN being adapted into a feature film…yet somehow I think this news makes it worth the wait!
THR’s Heat Vision reports Darren Aronofsky (right), who has BLACK SWAN in the can and WOLVERINE 2 close to being official, has signed up to direct MACHINE MAN for Mandalay Pictures. Word is he’ll help flesh out a script by Mark Heyman (BLACK SWAN) with hopes of shooting it after the massive Hugh Jackman-in-burns continuation.
Mandalay describes MACHINE MAN as an “amped up pop-thriller,” with the story centering on a gadget geek and engineer at a forward thinking tech firm who is tired of going through life average and unnoticed and is also obsessed with his own self improvement. He decides to replace his weak, fleshy parts with high-end titanium performance upgrades of his own design but then discovers other entities have designs on him for their own motives.
Barry will continue to hammer out one page at a time, until a whole novel is assembled for a targeted Spring, 2011 release from Vintage Books.
Man, Aronofsky sure thawed the thick sheet of ice attached to his name following THE FOUNTAIN, didn’t he? After THE WRESTLER and what sounds like a terrific BLACK SWAN, dude’s ascended to A-list tent-pole status. Good for him and Rachel…
So what ya got? You familiar with MACHINE MAN? Is Aronofsky the perfect choice or what? If not, then who?