Sci-Fi Film and Television Developments

The Invisible Man
12/12/08 – SCI FI Wire reported that David Goyer, who is planning on directing a new version of Universal's The Invisible Man, said he's turning in a script next week and hopes to begin shooting it toward the end of next year.  The movie, a reboot of the franchise based on H.G. Wells' original novel, centers on the nephew of the original character (played by Claude Rains in James Whale's original 1933 movie).  "It's the nephew of the original one, and he sort of perfects the process, and then Scotland Yard ends up getting a hold of him," Goyer said. "And they kind of have two choices: Try to kind of vivisect him and figure out what makes him tick, or they decide to opt for plan B, which is they turn him into a secret agent. So they send him into Imperial Russia, because a sort of war is starting to brew between England and Imperial Russia."  Goyer's so enthusiastic about the project that he's inserted an homage to the original '33 movie in The Unborn. "You can see in the background, she's watching a movie at the beginning of the film, and it's actually the old Universal Invisible Man," he said. "So hopefully that's a little future nod to myself. So we'll see. They like the concept a lot. They haven't read the script yet. I don't know. I'm pretty happy with it, I think it's a fun script."

7/28/08 - David S. Goyer is writing a new film adaptation of H.G. Wells' classic 1897 SF novella The Invisible Man for Universal Pictures, which will pick up the story where Wells left off.  Goyer envisions a period movie, taking place around the turn of the 20th century, a few months before Queen Victoria dies. "It's more sprawling, because it's ... big," he said. "It's got elements of horror, but it's sort of a big, epic adventure movie. Part of it takes place in England; part of it takes place in Persia; part of it takes place in Siberia. ... And I added a couple, I think, wrinkles to the notion of invisibility that nobody's managed to do before. So it kind of takes it to an extreme level."

12/31/06 - David S. Goyer will write and direct The Invisible Man, a new take on H.G. Wells' classic SF novel. Brian Grazer will produce for Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment.  Conceived as a sequel to Wells' original tale, the story centers on a British nephew of the original Invisible Man. Once he discovers his uncle's formula for achieving invisibility, he is recruited by British intelligence agency MI5 during World War II.

AlienAlmanac.com    2008