USA Today brings word Steven Spielberg has set his sights on producing and potentially directing a feature film adaptation of the late Michael Crichton’s yet-to-be-published novel “Pirate Latitudes,” an adventure story set off the coast of Jamaica in 1665. David Koepp, who recently penned Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull as well as adaptations of Crichton’s Jurassic Park and its sequel The Lost World, is set to adapt the screenplay.
Of course this will be for Spielberg’s newly funded DreamWorks Studios which describes the novel, set for book release Nov. 24, as the story of “a daring plan to infiltrate Port Royal, one of the world’s richest and most notorious cities, and raid a Spanish galleon filled with treasure.”
“It’s a mission movie, and we see it through the prism of what it might have been like to live on the island during that time,” says Stacey Snider, Spielberg’s partner in DreamWorks and the company’s co-chair and CEO. “Anything that Michael wrote, Steven would be keenly interested to read. But without Michael knowing it, or even me knowing it, it turns out Steven always wanted to direct his own pirate film.”
When asked if it would find problems with comparisons to Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, which is set to have Pirates of the Caribbean 4 released some time in 2011 or 2012, Snider says these swashbuckling movies won’t clash because Pirate Latitudes will be more grounded in reality, as opposed to the supernatural fantasy of the Disney films.
I know with Spielberg set to direct the Harvey remake next people began to wonder what happened to the guy that made Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark and Close Encounters. Well, perhaps he’s back.
You can preorder “Pirate Latitudes” from Amazon right here.
