SerpApi.Org
Ridley Scott is having a busier July than most directors half his age. The filmmaker turns 89 this November, and rather than edging toward retirement, he has around six projects in various stages of development as he promotes The Dog Stars, his Jacob Elordi-led adaptation of Peter Heller's post-apocalyptic novel.
The thriller was shot in only 34 days, a pace that has become something of a signature for the famously efficient filmmaker. True to form, Scott hasn't waited for one movie to open before locking down another. The question hanging over his most coveted project in recent weeks wasn't whether it would happen, but who would finance the project. Now there's an answer.
According to Deadline, Sony Pictures is in talks to pick up Scott's Treasure Island, with the director set to helm and Hugh Jackman expected to play Long John Silver. The movie is based on Robert Louis Stevenson's 1883 novel, the book that shaped almost every pirate cliché still in circulation. It follows young Jim Hawkins, who comes into possession of a map leading to a dead captain's hidden fortune and joins the voyage to recover it.
Gradually, he realizes his ship's charming cook, Long John Silver, is playing a far more dangerous game. Silver is one of literature's most slippery villains, and Jackman, who can toggle between warmth and menace with ease, is a strong choice for the role. His performance as Blackbeard in Pan was proof that he knows his way around a pirate villain.
Why This Pairing Is More Interesting Than It First Appears
Stevenson's story has been adapted countless times over the decades, across film, television, and animation, from Disney's 1950 version to Muppet Treasure Island and Treasure Planet. Yet it has been a remarkably long stretch since a major movie last took audiences aboard the Hispaniola. An entire generation of moviegoers has never seen Jim Hawkins on the big screen, which arguably works in Scott's favor. Even so, a little skepticism is fair. Scott's recent epics haven't been profitable for the studios that backed them. Napoleon and Gladiator II both came with budgets north of $200 million, and neither delivered returns that justified the cost.
A seafaring period production built around practical ships and, presumably, plenty of digital water effects will not come cheap. Pirate movies also have a long history of turning into costly misfires when studios get them wrong, and Cutthroat Island remains the genre's clearest warning sign. The 1995 flop helped sink Carolco Pictures outright and kept pirate movies taboo until Pirates of the Caribbean resurrected the genre eight years later.
At the same time, Disney is actively developing its Pirates of the Caribbean reboot, and a streaming series based on Stevenson's book is separately in the works. If Sony fast-tracks its Treasure Island adaptation, there's a genuine race brewing over which pirate project reaches audiences first. That said, this version has more going for it than most. The script comes from Jack Thorne, who won an Emmy for Adolescence and recently followed it with his adaptation of Lord of the Flies.
