Director Scott Derrickson at the New York premiere of The Day The Earth Stood Still in December 2008.
© Stephen Lovekin/Getty Images for 20th Century Fox
According to Variety, Warner Brothers has tapped Scott Derrickson to direct a major sci-fi effects movie merging the two far-future Dan Simmons novels Hyperion, a Hugo Award winner in 1990, and Fall of Hyperion, a Locus Award winner in 1991 and a Nebula Award nominee.
This despite the pasting that DESS received from critics, who found the film an unnecessary remake and a high-gloss bore – a verdict with which I heartily concur, as I have explained in detail elsewhere. It's quite a task making the catastrophic end of the world dull and uninvolving, yet Derrickson managed it. It's telling that the best thing in the film is the subdued cameo by John Cleese as a Mycroftian polymath.
Particularly of concern is the fact that the Hyperion series is complex and character-driven, and the characters are not out-of-the-box, standard fare: the cycle's central figure is an enigmatic, semiorganic killing machine called the Shrike, whose motivations remain largely a mystery until the second book (probably the reason the first two books are being merged for the film project). I have a sinking feeling that the people developing the movie read about the Shrike, said "this will be an awesome special effect," and that was the end of the meeting.
The Hyperion scripts are being written by Trevor Sands, a screenwriter-producer with a fairly short resume: he's worked recently on adaptations of Six Million Dollar Man (You didn't know there's going to be a movie? Of course there's going to be a movie!) and David Brin's novel Startide Rising – though these projects are still at a larval stage. The Hyperion film is being spearheaded by producer Graham King, who's been involved in a wide array of projects including Traffic and The Departed.
Comments
I’m actually pretty excited by this. I loved “Hyperion” when I read it.
I never speak out when it comes to movie translations of various media. That said, I feel so strongly about the Hyperion Cantos that I feel the need to post everywhere that combining two books into one movie is a bad idea! There is just WAY too much essential material in both books to go removing or hacking away at content. If they intend on cramming both books into one movie, it better be a six hour movie or I will be greatly disappointed. I don’t mind the director they have chosen… just so long as they don’t mess with the story in a severe way like what I am feeling will happen if they go through with this! Not to mention the fact that with one movie per book, if the movies are done correctly, it means more money in the long run for Hollywood and will please the fans of the series more as well!!!