Warner Bros Wins Jonathan Liebesman’s Odysseus: “300 Meets Taken”
Late last week, Warner Bros won a bidding war against Paramount Pictures to gain the rights toJonathan Liebesman’sOdysseus, a retelling of the story of the legendary Greek King and hero of Homer’s epic poem, the Odyssey. After fighting in the Trojan Wars for 20 years, Odysseus returned home to find his kingdom under the brutal occupation. He is forced to single-handedly fight a battle against an invading force, to take back his wife, his son and his kingdom. ProducerGianni Nunnaricame up with the story in a general meeting with Liebesman, who brought in screenwriterAnn Peacockwho wrote the filmmaker’s Sundance Film Festival thrillerThe Killing Room.
Listen, I use to call Jonathan Liebesman a hack, His early film efforts left a lot to be desired. We’re talking about the guy who madeDarkness FallsandThe Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning. However, my view of Liebesman changed completely after I screenedThe Killing Roomat Sundance. You can tell Liebesman really tried with this film, and created a movie he wanted to see, instead of a movie the studio demanded. It was enough for me to completely forget his earlier horror efforts.
One of the reasonsThe Killing Roomworks is because of the tight minimalistic storytelling, on the screen and on the page. I haven’t readOdysseus, but I’ve talked to people who have. And they can’t say enough great things about the tight 90-page screenplay.THRsays that the intent is not to make “a sleepy swords-and-sandles epic but a bloody relentless revenge movie,” like300meetsTaken. Liebesman toldFirstShowingthat he wants the movie to be a very gritty, hand-held, hardcore revenge movie, comparing it to Rambo, “where one guy just kicks a lot of ass.”
Up next for Liebesman is the sci-fi action filmBattle: Los Angeles, which is getting a fix up from Scott Silver before it goes into production. I heard the earlier draft was actually pretty bad, but offered some nice cinematic visuals.
