Caffeinated Clint
“Outlander” scribes Dirk Blackman and Howard McCain have been hired to rework the script for Lionsgate’s “Conan the Barbarian”, a restart of the popular movie series that launched Arnold Schwarzenegger’s career, says The Hollywood Reporter. And the writing team’s action-adventure screenplay “Amazon,” an epic about female warriors to which Scarlett Johansson has been attached, is sailing out of turnaround toward Lionsgate as well, with Neal Moritz and his Original Film banner coming on to produce once the deal is completed.
Thomas Dean Donnelly and Joshua Oppenheimer (“Sahara”) wrote earlier drafts of “Barbarian”, and though the producers were genuinely pleased with their efforts, felt it needed a sprucing.
“We all want this movie to go into production as soon as possible,” Producer Fredrik Malmberg said. “It’s a fast-tracked movie. Lionsgate felt the process was enhanced by having a second team come in and do a script.”
The new film will be an R-rated origin story based solely on the old comics.
“Fans expect (these types of movies) to be more true to the source material,” Malmberg said. “There’s no reason there couldn’t be a Conan movie every two years. He’s almost like Batman: He’s a dark hero. He’s a hard hero. He has to be badass, but we also have to like him.”
There’s currently no director on board “Conan”.
