Fede Alvarez has signed on to direct the Labyrinth spinoff.
The Don’t Breathe filmmaker will write the script with Jay Basu and the project will be developed by bosses at TriStar Pictures and The Jim Henson Co. with Lisa Henson producing.
The original 1986 movie featured Jennifer Connelly as a teenager on a quest to save her younger brother from late David Bowie’s goblin king character. It was puppet master and Muppets creator Jim Henson’s final film as a director and Monty Python star Terry Jones wrote the script. George Lucas executive produced it.
The new movie will take place in the same fantasy universe as the original film, but it will not feature Bowie’s character, according to Deadline.com.
“Labyrinth is one of the seminal movies from my childhood that made me fall in love with filmmaking,” Alvarez tells Deadline.com. “I couldn’t be more thrilled to expand on Jim Henson’s mesmerizing universe, and take a new generation of moviegoers back into the Labyrinth.”
Last year (16), it was rumored Guardians of the Galaxy writer Nicole Perlman had been hired to revamp the script for a remake of the movie following Bowie’s death in January, 2016, but she dismissed the rumors on social media.
“Guys, please don’t fall for all the clickbait,” she wrote in a series of posts on Twitter.com. “No one is remaking Labyrinth. That movie is perfect as it is.”
The screenwriter went on to admit she was in talks to work on a remake of Labyrinth back in 2014 and she was upset by suggestions movie bosses were capitalising on the loss of the film’s star to revive the project.
“Not ‘rebooting’ anything, guys…” she added. “Henson Co & I started talking in late 2014, so the timing of these rumors is so upsetting. I would never seek to profit from Bowie’s death… Labyrinth is my favorite film from childhood, so I share your concerns that any continuation of the world be handled with love and respect.”
Meanwhile, Alvarez’s movie will go into production when Fede and Basu wrap The Girl in the Spider’s Web. The filmmaker will direct the next installment of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo franchise, while Basu is writing the script. Principal photography on the project will begin in September (17).
