Wow, this Timur Bekmambetov is quite the go-getter!
In the last 4 weeks, we’ve featured stories that positioned the Russian WANTED director as co-producer (with Tim Burton) on ABRAHAM LINCOLN: VAMPIRE HUNTER, producer of a Russian alien invasion picture called THE DARKEST HOUR, as well as potential director of Summit’s THE LAST WITCH HUNTER. Like I said, one busy mofo…and it looks like dude just threw another slab of flesh on his plate!
While details are still rather scarce, word out of the Production Weekly Twitter feed has made mention of Bekmambetov being attached to adapt Peter Ackroyd’s new novel THE CASEBOOK OF VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN to the big screen. No kidding!
With a screenplay adapted by David Auburn (PROOF, THE LAKE HOUSE), THE CASE OF VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN tells the story of:
Two nineteenth-century Oxford students–Victor Frankenstein, a serious researcher, and the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley–who form an unlikely friendship.
This haunting and atmospheric novel opens with a heated discussion, as Shelley challenges the conventionally religious Frankenstein to consider his atheistic notions of creation and life. Afterward, these concepts become an obsession for the young scientist. As Victor begins conducting anatomical experiments to reanimate the dead, he at first uses corpses supplied by the coroner. But these specimens prove imperfect for Victor’s purposes. Moving his makeshift laboratory to a deserted pottery factory in Limehouse, he makes contact with the Doomsday men–the resurrectionists–whose grisly methods put Frankenstein in great danger as he works feverishly to bring life to the terrifying creature that will bear his name for eternity.
Sounds like solid throwback horror, even if a sly platform to explore the relation between religion and creationism. I’ve not read a Peter Ackroyd novel, so I can’t comment on the man’s writing style, but as far as concepts go, he’s got me from page one!
But how do you all feel? You think this is the best project for Bekmambetov to direct? would you like to see him step behind the camera on some of the aforementioned flicks he’s producing?
The much WANTED Angelina Jolie!