Although they’ve discussed the possibility before, Leonardo DiCaprio and Ridley Scott are slowly inching their way towards to a feature-film adaptation of Aldous Huxley’s classic dystopian novel “Brave New World”
The duo are now set to use their respective production companies — Appian Way and Scott Free –as a starring and helming vehicle respectively.
“Apocalypto” scribe Farhad Safinia has been hired to adapt the novel and is slated to begin working on it imminently.
“Brave New World” centers on a 26th century caste-system world that has seemingly achieved utopia by tightly controlling birth and outlawing family. DiCaprio would presumably play Bernard, the story’s protagonist, who is in a lower-caste and is persecuted when the leaders of the society find his behavior antisocial. Another key character who may feature heavily in the script is Lenina who serves as Bernard’s love interest.
The article also notes that Scott is not committed to anything post-“Robin Hood” — what about his return to the “Alien” franchise? — and with the only project on DiCaprio’s plate being “Inception,” production on “Brave New World” could come together rather quickly depending on the development of the script, but as of right now it still sounds a little ways away.
Scott’s last foray into a futuristic dystopia was one “Blade Runner.” [RiskyBizBlog]
Oh, good. The guy who wrote the 90-minute jungle chase movie.
I'm not a huge fan of Brave New World, but the idea of DiCaprio as John the Savage (who he'll probably play, Simon) makes me vom nonetheless.
Hmmm yeah it's been a while since I read it but John's story is the more significant, right?
It'd make more sense at this point but perhaps they want someone else as the Savage? The article does go out of its way to say DiCaprio is likely to play Bernard.
'Brave New World' is second to Zamaytin's 'We.' Though I love both books, I think 'We' would be a more interesting movie. I recently watched 'City of Ember,' which runs along the same lines. This all reminds me of my need to see 'Metropolis.'
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Brave New World is pretty anti-cinematic. It's going to need to be quite radically 're-imagined' to be in any way satisfying.