Science Fiction World

The on again off again big screen adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book appears to be on again. According to Deadline, Disney resurrected the project last Friday with a high six figure bid for the rights, making the studio the third (at least) to take over the project.

When we last wrote about this back in May 2011 it was to announce that Wayfare Entertainment and Framestore had assumed control of the adaptation from Miramax Films and that a development deal had been struck between Chris Columbus’ 1492 Pictures and the South Korean company CJ Entertainment. The project promptly found its way into the development graveyard however and despite repeatedly renewing the option, Framestore and Wayfare were unable to get the project out of the ground (let alone off it).

Throughout these many trials and tribulations, Oscar winning writer/director Neil Jordan remained attached to helm the adaptation, but no longer. Considering movies like The Crying Game, Mona Lisa and Michael Collins, and the darkly atmospheric A Company of Wolves, Jordan really was an inspired choice to direct this fantastical story, laced as it is with a certain gritty and dark realism. Now however the helm has passed to Henry Selick, known for directing Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas, but also the critically acclaimed adaptation of Gaiman’s Coraline, both of which are animated movies.

As you might suspect this change of direction heralds another significant change, and what promised to be a live-action adaptation under Jordan is now animation under Selick. This shift from live-action to animation is a little disappointing, but with Gaiman's genius for story-telling and Selick's direction this should nonetheless be something to look forward to.

Written with a beguiling simplicity and a premise that is classic Gaiman, The Graveyard Book is a hugely entertaining story about Nobody, Nobody Owens that is. As the novel opens, the protagonist is an adventurous toddler in a middling English town who loses everything one night, name and all, when his family is brutally murdered. Escaping to the local graveyard, the toddler is adopted and brought up by the spirits of the dead, acquiring both a mysterious undead guardian and his peculiar name.