Xixax Film Forum

Darren Aronofsky to Develop, Direct 'Machine Man'
Source: Hollywood Reporter

Darren Aronofsky continues fill out his dance in the wake of the buzz he is generating from his Black Swan supernatural drama.

While he waits for his deal to close to direct Wolverine 2, the filmmaker has signed on to develop and direct Machine Man, a cybernetic thriller for Mandalay, which sees him reunite with Swan co-writer Mark Heyman.

Machine is based on a partial manuscript by Max Barry that Mandalay picked up last year. Aronofsky and Mandalay will work with Heyman to adapt the book for the screen, in the hopes of making it his project after he shoots Wolverine 2.

Cathy Schulman will produce via the Mandalay banner. Barry will serve as an executive producer.

Described by Mandalay as an "amped up pop-thriller," the story centers on a gadget geek and engineer at a forward thinking tech firm who is tired of going through life average and unnoticed and is also obsessed with his own self improvement. He decides to replace his weak, fleshy parts with high-end titanium performance upgrades of his own design but then discovers other entities have designs on him for their own motives

Barry is publishing one page per day in real time as an online serial, with the whole story to be published as a novel by Vintage Books in Spring, 2011.

Adam Stone is overseeing the project for Mandalay, which is currently is on post-production on Salvation Boulevard starring Pierce Brosnan, Greg Kinnear and Marisa Tomei.

Aronofsky and Heyman previously worked together on The Wrestler, in which Heyman acted as co-producer. Both are repped by CAA.

So he's basically combining Robocop and Wolverine into something called Machine Man?

Is he real-life trolling?

Arnofsky is starting to me remind me of an American version of an early Roman Polanski. Aspects of dark realism mixed with genre stories. Nothing against it. Every director has their own personality and if he wants to continue with this in a project like Machine Man and Wolverine II, all the more power to him. If the Bond producers allowed Quantum of Solace to be very different for Bond, I don't see how producers won't also allow for Wolverine to be radicalized a little bit. I have no idea what Machine Man would be like if it ever gets made, but I thought around the time of Requiem for A Dream that Arnofsky may be best as an innovative director for pictures which sound a little more Hollywood in their nature. Richard Lester sacrificed the best parts of his style and sense of intelligence when he started doing Musketeer movies and Superman, but I think Arnofsky will hold the water much better.