David Fincher’s next film for Netflix is his long, long cherished remake of Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers On A Train. More here.
Following the release of The Killer on Netflix late last year, David Fincher signed a new deal with the streaming platform which is believed to tie him exclusively to the company for another three years.
While the boss of Cannes (and anybody else who yearns to see Fincher’s work back on the big screen) expressed some dismay that the American filmmaker’s next few projects would go straight to the small screen, at least Fincher’s Netflix deal has seen him become more prolific of late.
In the last three years, Fincher has created Mank and The Killer for Netflix, a veritable landslide of films when you consider that prior to this flurry of films, it took Fincher almost a decade to release two films, those being 2011’s The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo and 2014’s Gone Girl.
According to reports, Fincher’s current filmmaking pace looks set to continue given that his next project is said to be a long-gestating remake of the 1951 Alfred Hitchcock film, Strangers On A Train.
Read more: The Killer review | Michael Fassbender’s hitman goes on the run
Fincher has been circling this project for a long time given that it was actually announced in partnership with Warner Bros in January of 2015. Fincher was set to direct the project with actor/producer Ben Affleck on board and Gone Girl writer Gillian Flynn tasked with adapting the novel (which was written by Patricia Highsmith, the author of The Talented Mr Ripley and the other novels in that series).
The synopsis for Hitchcock’s adaptation goes like this: ‘two strangers – tennis pro Guy Haines (Farley Granger) who is seeking a divorce, and mentally unstable socialite Bruno Antony (Robert Walker) – who strike up a conversation on a train. Each has someone they want to get out of the way, so the socialite proposes they ‘swap murders’ and thus the killings could not be traced back to them. Haines considers it all a joke, but Anthony is quite serious. Soon things spiral out of control.’
It’s said that David Fincher originally intended to update the story, changing the location to a private jet and having Affleck play a movie star ‘in the middle of awards season campaigning.’ When his private plane breaks down, he is given a ride to LA on another plane ‘by a wealthy and dangerous stranger.’
World Of Reel is now reporting that the latest iteration of the project will return the action to a train setting, while Affleck is said to be ‘loosely involved’. The project is said to be the next one on Fincher’s slate though.
Given that one of David Fincher’s other projects that was said to be bubbling up was a remake of the smash TV drama Squid Game, this seems like a more prudent direction to go in. After all, Squid Game only debuted a couple of years ago, so remaking it so soon seemed like a creatively odd decision, especially given the show’s huge popularity. More news will likely emerge in the coming months regarding this latest project and as we hear more, you can be sure we’ll let you know.
