From DHD – For the past four years Paramount Pictures has been developing a feature adaptation of Frank Herbert’s Dune, but now their time is running out – Paramount’s option on the rights expires spring 2011, and the Herbert estate will not renew the option unless the studio has set a production start date by then. Paramount and producers Kevin Misher and Richard P. Rubinstein are going out to directors now, with the latest draft by Chase Palmer. And both the studio and the Herbert estate have to agree on the director.
Paramount is going to have to make a choice – on the one hand, they have a hugely popular book franchise with a build in audience, but on the other, a movie that will cost well over $100 million to make (Dune is often called the Sci Fi Lord of the Rings), and the last Dune movie (directed by David Lynch back in 1984) was a colossal flop. (However the SyFy miniseries was very successful.) With such a large financial risk, it’s likely that the studio would rather forfeit the six figures it has paid in development costs than move ahead if they’re not absolutely sure.
So it’s four years later, and we still might not get a movie out of it all. This is what people mean when they talk about development hell…
Book Jacket:
Here is the novel that will be forever considered a triumph of the imagination. Set on the desert planet Arrakis, Dune is the story of the boy Paul Atreides, who would become the mysterious man known as Maud’dib. He would avenge the traitorous plot against his noble family–and would bring to fruition humankind’s most ancient and unattainable dream.
A stunning blend of adventure and mysticism, environmentalism and politics, Dune won the first Nebula Award, shared the Hugo Award, and formed the basis of what is undoubtedly the grandest epic in science fiction. Frank Herbert’s death in 1986 was a tragic loss, yet the astounding legacy of his visionary fiction will live forever.
You can read an excerpt here.
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