It was reported last week that Martin Scorsese is setting up his next movie. The project is based on Peter Cameron’s What Happens at Night, a spooky tale of an American couple who travel to a small European town to adopt a baby, but all is not as it seems. Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence will star in the film, and DiCaprio recently teased that Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo will be a “reference point” for the project.
While speaking on The Big Picture podcast, DiCaprio mentioned he’s “working on a film where [Vertigo] is a reference point.” Although he didn’t mention the project by name, it seems clear that he’s referring to What Happens at Night.
“Had a conversation with Marty [Scorsese] about it. Any time you get to sit and talk with him about movies, it’s a religious experience,” DiCaprio said. “But when he talks about a movie he’s still trying to figure out, it’s like, ‘Each decade that movie means something different to me. Is she a ghost, or is she not a ghost? Is she there? Is he a ghost? What is it?’ So I rewatched it, and I knew the exact moments in the redwoods that he was talking about. I was like that’s the moment that Marty felt that. So yeah, there’s something we’re working on that has been a reference to that.“
With notes of The Shining and Scorsese’s own Shutter Island, What Happens at Night “is a dream-like story of a married American couple who travel to a small, snowy European town to adopt a baby. They check into a cavernous, largely deserted hotel where they encounter an enigmatic cast of characters including a flamboyant chanteuse, a depraved businessman and a charismatic faith healer. Nothing is quite as it seems in this strange, frozen world. As the couple struggle to claim their baby, the less they seem to know about themselves and the life they’ve built together.“
Vertigo is not only one of Hitchcock’s finest movies but also one of the best of all time. So, of course, it might be getting a remake. Robert Downey Jr. has been tentatively attached to star in a remake of the iconic film for over three years. Steven Knight (Peaky Blinders) is writing the script, and as of just a few months ago, he was still working on it.
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