The founder of the literary mashup, Seth Grahame-Smith, has just announced a movie deal for  his next book, Unholy Night, (Hachette/Grand Central, 4/10/12) a retelling of the story of the Three Kings of the Nativity.

The film adaptation of Grahame-Smith’s second mashup novel, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, is set to be released (in 3-D, of course) this coming June.

The adaptation of the first in the genre, Pride And Prejudice And Zombies, has had a troubled history. Blake Lively was the latest in a string of actresses to turn down the lead role, following Natalie Portman, Emma Stone, Anne Hathaway, Scarlett Johansson, Mia Wasikowska and Rooney Mara. In late October, the film’s third director left the project.

Marti Noxon, who wrote the most recent script, told Movies.com recently that she finds it a “a little baffling,” that the project is taking so long to get off the ground but feels it’s “very hard to sell a comedy-horror concept” right now, making it “hard to find an actress who is super hot” to play the lead.

That’s likely to change if Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter is a success.

The steampunk novel, Boneshaker, by Cherie Priest (Macmillan/Tor, 2009) was an EarlyWord readers’ favorite books.

It’s also caught the eye of Hollywood and has been signed for a film adaptation. The script is being written, but no director or cast has been named yet.

It’s the first in a series, followed by,

Dreadnought, (Macmillan/Tor, 2010)

Ganymede, (Macmillan/Tor; Sept., 2011)

Inexplicable, according to the author’s Web site, the fourth volume in the series will arrive in fall, 2012, followed by the fifth, Fiddlehead the following year.

Movie premieres are so yesterday. Now we’re expected to get all breathless over the world premiere of a movie’s trailer.

Good Morning America did just that yesterday for the “world premiere ” of the trailer of Disney’s John Carter. Never mind that a teaser trailer came out in July, this is the full-length trailer. There’s still a bit of a wait for the real thing; it doesn’t hit theaters until March 9th.

The movie is based largely on Edgar Rice Burroughs’ A Princess of Mars, (available in trade pbk from RH/Modern Library; it was originally published as a magazine series in 1917) the first title in the John Carter novels. Burroughs also wrote the Tarzan series.

Friday Night Lights‘ Taylor Kitsch plays the title role. In 2012, he will also appear in Oliver Stone’s Savages, along with John Travolta, Uma Thurman and Benicio Del Toro. It is based on the book by Don Winslow (S&S, 2010).

Below is the full trailer:

The celebrity Web site FabLife kicks off Dystopian Week, a look at upcoming book adaptations, with Lauren Oliver’s Delirium, (HarperCollins).

It was recently picked as a best teen book by both Kirkus and the Amazon editors.

Oliver tells FabLife that she expects to be very involved in the filmmaking process, saying, “One of the reasons I really wanted to work with [producers Paula Mazur and Mitch Kaplan] specifically was that they got on the phone with me from the start, explained their vision, and it really felt like a collaboration from the start.”

Not surprising, since Kaplan has been very involved with books and authors. He’s the owner of Books & Books, Miami, Fla. and was recently honored at the National Book Awards. This is the second title that he and Mazur have optioned, after The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society (Kenneth Branagh, who was signed to direct it back in August, but has turned his attention to another project).

What’s a dystopian novel without a sequel? Coming at the end of February is a follow-up, Pandemonium. Oliver talks about it on MTV’s Hollywood Crush blog.

Pandemonium Lauren Oliver Retail Price: $13.99 Hardcover: 384 pages Publisher: HarperCollins – (2012-03-06) ISBN / EAN: 006197806X/9780061978067

Oliver’s first book, Before I Fall, is also being adapted. Oliver says she has seen the script and “loves it.” Both movies await a director and cast.

The holiday movie season kicks off today and three of the big movies are based on books (The Hollywood Reporter rounds up their reviews of all the films opening today):

Movie Title: A Dangerous Method

Director: David Cronenberg

Starring:

Viggo Mortensen … Sigmund Freud

Keira Knightley … Sabina Spielrein

Michael Fassbender … Carl Jung

Based on: A Most Dangerous Method by John Kerr (RH, 1993)

Tie-in:

A Dangerous Method (Movie Tie-in Edition): The Story of Jung, Freud, and Sabina Spielrein (Vintage) John Kerr Retail Price: $16.95 Paperback: 624 pages Publisher: Vintage – (2011-10-25) ISBN / EAN: 0307950271 / 9780307950277

Audio from AudioGo, 11/2011)

Official Web Site: ADangerousMethod-TheMovie.com

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Title: Hugo 

Director: Martin Scorsese

Based on: The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick

Format: Live action, 3-D

Starring: Jude Law, Chloe Moretz, Ben Kingsley, Sacha Baron Cohen, Emily Mortimer and Michael Stuhlbarg

iTunes Site, with trailers and show times

Tie-in:

The Hugo Movie Companion Brian Selznick Retail Price: $19.99 Hardcover: 256 pages Publisher: Scholastic Press – (2011-10-01) ISBN / EAN: 0545331552 / 9780545331555

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Nov 23, 2011

Movie Title: My Week with Marilyn

Director: Simon Curtis

Starring:

Michelle Williams … Marilyn Monroe

Kenneth Branagh … Sir Laurence Olivier

Eddie Redmayne … Colin Clark

Judi Dench … Dame Sybil Thorndike

Based on: My Week with Marilyn (2000), a memoir by Colin Clark (the son of Sir. Kenneth Clark, best known for the classic BBC documentary, Civilization, recently re-released in HD). It caused a sensation when it was published in the UK ten years ago. It’s been released for the first time here,  as both a hardcover and audio tie-in (also on OverDrive).

Official Movie Site: MyWeekWithMarilynMovie.com

Tie-in:

My Week with Marilyn Colin Clark Retail Price: $16.00 Paperback: 336 pages Publisher: Weinstein Books – (2011-10-04) ISBN / EAN: 1602861498 / 9781602861497

Audio; Dreamscape

Today is just the beginning, three dozen movies will open through Christmas Day, aimed both at families and at Oscar consideration. Entertainment Weekly‘s Jess Cagle offers his assessment of the top twelve (8 of which are based on books) on the CBS Early Show (for tie-ins, check our list of Upcoming Movies Based on Books, with Tie-ins).

Tim Burton will develop the surprise YA hit Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, Ransom Riggs (Quirk Books, Jun, 2011) as a “potential directing project,” according to Deadline.

Riggs has the strange hobby of collecting old snapshots, he published highlights of his collection in his blog on the Mental Floss magazine site. For Miss Peregrine, he wove a story around some strange and haunting Victorian photos. It’s been on the NYT Children’s Hardcover list for 22 weeks, raching a high of #2.

An as-yet-untitled sequel to Miss Peregine is scheduled for Spring 2013.

Coming in April is a book that expands on Riggs’s Mental Floss series, called Talking Pictures.

Talking Pictures Ransom Riggs Retail Price: $13.99 Paperback: 368 pages Publisher: It Books/HarperCollins(2012-04-10) ISBN / EAN: 9780062099495, 0062099493

Last year, Angelina Jolie told interviewers that she was planning to play Cleopatra in James Cameron’s 3-D adaptation of Stacy Schiff’s critically acclaimed and best-selling bio, Cleopatra: A Life, (Little, Brown/ Hachette, 2010). Cameron, however, dropped out when he decided to do Avatar 2.

News has been scarce since, but Variety now reports that David Fincher (The Social Network, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) may direct. Angelina Jolie is still planning to play the Egyptian queen (who, according to Schiff’s biography as well as other historical sources, was ethnically Greek) and has her “heart set” on Fincher. It’s uncertain whether it will be shot in 3-D, as was planned when Cameron was set to direct.

Of course, Fincher could also turn his attention to the next title in Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy, The Girl Who Played with Fire, or any of several other possible projects, including a version of Jules Verne’s 20000 Leagues Under the Sea.

If, like us, you had difficulty downloading the first full-length Hunger Games trailer from iTunes yesterday, it’s now available via YouTube (click the link, to access the full-screen version).

Reactions from fans as well as critics (with the exception of the Wall Street Journal‘s”Speakeasy“) are positive.

By all accounts, screaming fans went crazy for the first full-length Hunger Games trailer when it appeared on Good Morning America‘s jumbotron on Times Square this morning.

It’s supposed to be on iTunes exclusively, but we didn’t have success in getting it to play (too much traffic?)

Based on Mary Norton’s classic children’s tale, The Borrowers, (Harcourt, 1953), the Japanese film The Secret World of Arietty was the third-highest-grossing movie of 2010 in Japan, after Alice in Wonderland and Toy Story 3.

The U.S. version, which opens here February 17, uses the voices of American actors including Amy Poehler and Will Arnett as Arrietty’s parents and Carol Burnett as the housekeeper.

When the British version opened in the UK, it received kudos for its hand-drawn elegance.

Trailer for the American version:

VIZ Media is releasing tie-ins:

The Art of The Secret World of Arrietty Hiromasa Yonebayashi Retail Price: $34.99 Paperback: 200 pages Publisher: VIZ Media LLC – (2012-01-03) ISBN / EAN: 1421541181 / 9781421541181

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The Secret World of Arrietty (Film Comic), Vol. 1 (Arrietty Film Comics) Hiromasa Yonebayashi Retail Price: $16.99 Paperback: 272 pages Publisher: VIZ Media LLC – (2012-01-03) ISBN / EAN: 1421541165 / 9781421541167

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The Secret World of Arrietty (Film Comic), Vol. 2 (Arrietty Film Comics) Hiromasa Yonebayashi Retail Price: $16.99 Paperback: 336 pages Publisher: VIZ Media LLC – (2012-01-03) ISBN / EAN: 1421541173 / 9781421541174

Kirkus said of the true crime story, The Man in the Rockefeller Suit by Mark Seal (Viking, 6/2/11), “Patricia Highsmith couldn’t have written a more compelling thriller.” Director Scott Cooper (Crazy Heart) has been in talks to direct a movie based on this unlikely tale of a man who managed to con people into believing he was a member of the Rockefeller family, helping him to land prestigious jobs on Wall Street. He was sentenced to jail after kidnapping his own daughter and is now facing charges that he murdered his former landlord in 1985.

The movie may be on the back burner for a while, however. Cooper’s next project is likely to be the adaptation of the Claire Messud novel, The Emperor’s Children (Knopf, 2006), replacing Noah Baumbach. It’s set to star Keira Knightley, Michelle Williams, Eric Bana and Richard Gere.

The Man in the Rockefeller Suit: The Astonishing Rise and Spectacular Fall of a Serial Imposter Mark Seal Retail Price: $26.95 Hardcover: 336 pages Publisher: VIKING ADULT – (2011-06-02) ISBN / EAN: 0670022748/9780670022748

Thorndike Large Print

The Financial Lives of the Poets by cult favorite Jess Walters (Harper, 2009) is being adapted for a movie titled Bailout, directed by independent filmmaker Michael Winterbottom. First announced back in the spring, it’s now scheduled to begin shooting in January.

The novel satirizes the economic meltdown by following a man who becomes a pot dealer after his idea for a Web site that reports financial news in the form of poetry fails (unsurprisingly). Reviewing it in the NYT, Janet Maslin said, “Mixing financial advice with poetry is a terrible idea. But combining the elements of tragedy with a sitcom sensibility is a good one. And it’s what Jess Walter continues to do best.”

The Financial Lives of the Poets Jess Walter Retail Price: $25.99 Hardcover: 304 pages Publisher: Harper – (2009-10-01) ISBN / EAN: 0061916048 / 9780061916045

It’s difficult to imagine someone thinking “Steve Carell” when reading Carolyn Parkhurst’s unusual debut, The Dogs of Babel, (Little, Brown, 2003; hardcover jacket above left; paperback on the right). Nonetheless, its reported that he plans to produce and star in the film version. Carrell has many projects in the fire, but this one may have an edge because John Carney just signed on as director. He is regarded as the perfect person for the project, based on his art-house hit, Once. He  signed Scarlett Johansson in June for  the follow-up, Can a Song Save Your Life?

The novel, about a grieving widower who tries to his wife’s dog to speak, so he can find out how she died. It was described by Janet Maslin in the NYT as a “captivatingly strange book.”

The cover for the movie tie-in editions of The Girl with The Dragon Tattoo is much darker and moodier than the original, although still retaining a bit of that distinctive yellow. It is being released in trade pbk (9780307949493), mass market (9780307949486) and audio (UNABR., 9780307989550). The movie adaptation arrives Dec. 21.

To bring to life the look of Stieg Larsson’s goth punk computer hacker heroine, Lisbeth Salander, director David Fincher chose rock star stylist Trish Summerville. Soon, you, too, can get that look. Summerville has designed a “Dragon Tattoo” line of clothing for the Swedish-based (how appropriate) retail chain H&M. The line launches online and in stores on December 14th.

A new extended movie trailer gives a sense of the movie’s mood.

Rooney Maura, who plays Lisbeth Salander, adopts a softer style for the Nov.Vogue cover and photo shoot (we detect a dragon cleverly embroidered into the back of her dress).

The story explores how she won the role, despite strong objections from studio execs. (they thought she was “too sensible”).

Martin Scorsese’s Hugo, his first film based on a children’s book and his first foray into 3-D, arrives in theaters this Thanksgiving. Bets are now being taken on what he will direct next.

According to Variety, he is “seriously considering” jumping on another bandwagon — Scandinavian crime fiction, in the form of Jo Nesbo’s The Snowman (Knopf, May, 2011), book #7 in the Norwegian author’s Harry Hole series.

It won’t be the first adaptation of a Nesbo title. A Norwegian-language film based on Nesbo’s standalone, Headhunters recently broke Scandinavian box office records (explaining why the cover of the U.S. edition, released in Sept., bears the words “Now a Major Motion Picture”). Summit is planning on an English-language version of Headhunters, following in the footsteps of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, which was originally adapted into a Swedish-language film, followed by David Fincher’s English-language version coming Dec. 21.

Scorsese, however, has many possible upcoming projects, most of them based on books:

Furious Love — based on the book about the Burton/Taylor love affair by Sam Kashner and Nancy Schoenberger (Harper, 2010). Deadline reported in June that Paramount was finalizing a a deal to produce the movie, with Scorsese directing.

The Irishman — based on “I Heard You Paint Houses”: Frank “the Irishman” Sheeran and Closing the Case of Jimmy Hoffa by Charles Brandt (Steerforth, 2004). Back in March, stories quoted Robert De Niro saying he was “fully committed” to starring in this movie, along with Joe Pesci and Al Pacino. No news since, however.

The Gambler — based on the novella by Fyodor Dostoevsky. The film journal, The Moving Arts, recently published a story about Scorsese’s fascination with the Russian writer (Taxi Driver, “clearly owes [a debt] to Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment and, more notably, Notes from the Underground“). In August, Deadline wrote that Leonardo Di Caprio was set to star (and mistakenly referred to it as a remake of the 1974 movie of the same title starring James Caan).

Silence — In February, The Playlist confidently proclaimed this would be Scorsese’s next film after Hugo, calling it the director’s “passion project that’s been percolating since early 2006.” Daniel Day-Lewis, Benicio Del Toro were attached to star. It’s based on the Japanese writer, Shusaku Endo’s 1966 novel Chinmoku. The 1980 English translation, titled Silence, is still in print.

The Wolf of Wall Street — based on the memoir by Jordan Belfort (Bantam, 2007), head of a notorious investment firm in the 1990’s. In May, it was announced that, after a long delay, the movie was back on track again, to star Di Caprio, but it would have to wait until the actor completed filming of The Great Gatsby with Baz Luhrman.

Sinatra — the one directorial project Scorsese is attached to that is NOT based on a book (although he was once planning to direct a film based on Nick Tosches’s book about Dean Martin, Dino). No news on this one since March.

Many have tried, and most have failed, to predict what Scorsese will tackle next. Rather than joining that pointless exercise, tell us, which would you most like to see him do?

Our vote? Furious Love. Angelina Jolie was once rumored for the role of Elizabeth Taylor. How about Scorsese’s favorite actor, Di Caprio, for Burton?