Oh, the jokes of bringing dead things back to life are just too easy so we’ll avoid them, but in case you’ve just been aching for the 1990 medical thriller “Flatliners” to be retold, well today is your lucky day.
Believe it or not, this project has been kicking around for a while. Back in 2008, Stephen Susco (writer of “The Grudge” films) mentioned in an interview with Collider that he was working on developing the movie into a TV series with Michael Douglas to star. “It takes place in the same world as the movie,” Susco said at the time about his spin-off iteration, but clearly that didn’t get off the ground. So enter “Source Code” writer Ben Ripley. Sony has tapped the writer to take on the project and he’s no stranger to high concept fare.
If you don’t remember the original film it starred Kiefer Sutherland, Julia Roberts, Kevin Bacon, William Baldwin and Oliver Platt and centered on a bunch of med-students who try to explore the afterlife by killing and reviving each other, only to be haunted by what they’ve seen. We thought med-students were smarter than that.
Of course, there’s no word yet on where Ripley will take the story but he’s riding high right now. “Source Code” was a $120 million worldwide success and he space/horror flick “7th Day” recently landed Aussie director Shane Abbess at the helm. So a remake of “Flatliners”? Yeah, sure whatever. We’re pretty sure a shortlist with every hot young name in Hollywood will arrive soon enough. [Deadline]
