I remember reading that Vanity Fair article many moons ago about Timothy Treadwell aka 'The Grizzly Man'.
Tragic.
At the time, I was working with David Aaron Cohen on a remake pitch for 'The Professionals' and WB. That project never went anywhere but Treadwell stuck in my mind. I remember even mentioning that guy's name as I sat with the producers. They loved the concept and told me I should write it.
Fast forward to two summers ago and I was laid up with a ruptured tibial posterior. JAWS was on AMC and I got to thinking that they don't make films like that anymore. Good characters, a bad situation and a force with no conscience other than feeding and survival.
Treadwell. Again. Life rights are a bitch, so I improvised.
RED MACHINE was born within 10 days. 104 pages of great characters and terror. Jaws with Claws. But these weren't your stereotypical studio cliches with hot chicks, bare midriffs and pot smoking morons running around the woods.
No. These characters were actually intelligent.
I had been in touch with a talent manager and her client was considering another film I wrote about six months before I wrote Red. They passed on that project but asked to be first eyes on my new script. I sent Red over and within 2 days, Adrien Brody was attached to star and produce.
Wow. An Academy Award winning actor was set to do my film. A few months later, the script was optioned and thus started the painful year long process of 'no one can read this script...'
It sucked. Development stalled. Months passed. Nothing happened. My option money disappeared and I was getting anxious. Brody dropped out to shoot 'Predators' and hasn't come back yet...
June 1, 2010 the rights came back to me and my reps at APA quickly attached David Hackl to direct and now it has gone industry wide. They're marketing it as a summer action thriller which is genius imo. An event film. The script got huge interest last week and APA sent it out.
Let's see who bites.
