Warner Bros. in Talks to Make THE DARK TOWER; Ron Howard to Direct; Javier Bardem May Star

Fans of Stephen King’s post-apocalyptic epic The Dark Tower will be happy to hear that the troubled film adaptation has some new life at a new studio. We have reports that Warner Bros. is close to a deal that would give the go-ahead on the project with Ron Howard directing at least the first film. Javier Bardem has also been mentioned as possibly starring as gunslinger Roland Deschain. After Universal passed on Howard’s script last summer, screenwriter Akiva Goldsman and producer Brian Grazer toyed with the idea of turning the property into a television series and made significant budget cuts to get the project moving. With the TV series set up at HBO, it was up to Howard and Grazer to find a home for the feature. It looks like that’s got some legs now, as Warner Bros. is paying Goldsman to do a polish on his script. While Bardem was previously attached when the picture was at Universal, his involvement going forward will depend on his availability. Projections have the film slated to begin production in early 2013. Hit the jump for more on The Dark Tower.

Deadline reported on the progress of Howard and Grazer’s adaptation of Stephen King’s The Dark Tower. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the property, here’s the synopsis:

In the story, Roland Deschain is the last living member of a knightly order known as gunslingers and the last of the line of “Arthur Eld”, his world’s analogue of King Arthur. The world he lives in is quite different from our own, yet it bears striking similarities to it. Politically organized along the lines of a feudal society, it shares technological and social characteristics with the American Old West but is also magical. While the magical aspects are largely gone from Mid-World, some vestiges of them remain, along with the relics of a highly advanced, but long vanished, society.

Roland’s quest is to find the Dark Tower, a fabled building said to be the nexus of all universes. Roland’s world is said to have “moved on”, and indeed it appears to be coming apart at the seams as mighty nations have been torn apart by war, entire cities and regions vanish without a trace and time does not flow in an orderly fashion. Even the Sun sometimes rises in the north and sets in the east. As the series opens, Roland’s motives, goals and age are unclear, though later installments shed light on these mysteries.

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David Cronenberg to Direct and Produce Drama Pilot KNIFEMAN About 18th Century Surgeon John Hunter

David Cronenberg is teaming up with Media Rights Capital for a new television drama, Knifeman.  The story sounds like just the sort of thing that would lure the only director listed on the Wikipedia page for “body horror”: “[Knifeman] centers on the trials and triumphs of a radical, self-educated surgeon delivering a visceral portrait of the extraordinary and unorthodox lengths he will go to uncover the secrets of the human body.”  The book is based on the Wendy Moore novel The Knife Man, a biography about 18th century surgeon John Hunter.  THR mentions neither Hunter nor his century, so I wonder if this is a modern-day adaptation inspired by Hunter.  I hope not.  The period tale sounds much more interesting than your typical medical drama, and makes enough sense for Cronenberg coming on the heels of the A Dangerous Method, a biopic about Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung.

Cronenberg will direct the pilot, and stay on as executive producer.  Rolin Jones will script Knifeman based on a story he developed with his fellow Friday Night Lights writer Ron Fitzgerald.  Hit the jump for a synopsis of Moore’s book.

In an era when bloodletting was considered a cure for everything from colds to smallpox, surgeon John Hunter was a medical innovator, an eccentric, and the person to whom anyone who has ever had surgery probably owes his or her life. In this sensational and macabre story, we meet the surgeon who counted not only luminaries Benjamin Franklin, Lord Byron, Adam Smith, and Thomas Gainsborough among his patients but also “resurrection men” among his close acquaintances. A captivating portrait of his ruthless devotion to uncovering the secrets of the human body, and the extraordinary lengths to which he went to do so—including body snatching, performing pioneering medical experiments, and infecting himself with venereal disease—this rich historical narrative at last acknowledges this fascinating man and the debt we owe him today. [Amazon]

Cronenberg recently wrapped production on his next film, Cosmopolis—Robert Pattinson, Sarah Gadon, Kevin Durand, Jay Baruchel, Samantha Morton, Juliette Binoche, Paul Giamatti, and Mathieu Amalric star.

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