Annihilation (2018)

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ANNIHILATION
Release: (TBC)



Synopsis

Area X has been cut off from the rest of the continent for decades. Nature has reclaimed the last vestiges of human civilization. The first expedition returned with reports of a pristine, Edenic landscape; the second expedition ended in mass suicide, the third expedition in a hail of gunfire as its members turned on one another. The members of the eleventh expedition returned as shadows of their former selves, and within weeks, all had died of cancer. In Annihilation, the first volume of Jeff VanderMeer’s Southern Reach trilogy, we join the twelfth expedition.

The group is made up of four women: an anthropologist; a surveyor; a psychologist, the de facto leader; and our narrator, a biologist. Their mission is to map the terrain, record all observations of their surroundings and of one anotioner, and, above all, avoid being contaminated by Area X itself.

They arrive expecting the unexpected, and Area X delivers–they discover a massive topographic anomaly and life forms that surpass understanding–but it’s the surprises that came across the border with them and the secrets the expedition members are keeping from one another that change everything.

Starring (TBC) NATALIE PORTMAN, JULIANNE MOORE, TILDA SWINTON



Directed by ALEX GARLAND
Screenplay by ALEX GARLAND
Based on the novel by JEFF VANDERMEER
Produced by SCOTT RUDIN

Released by PARAMOUNT PICTURES

News:

Scott Rudin is producing the project, which is an adaptation of a book by Jeff VanderMeer.

Natalie Portman is in early negotiations to star in Annihilation, a post-apocalyptic horror adventure feature that Alex Garland is directing for Paramount as his follow-up to Ex Machina.

Scott Rudin is producing the project, which is an adaptation of a book by Jeff VanderMeer.

The story sees a biologist, to be played by Portman, take part of a four-person expedition into Area X, a territory cutoff from civilization. While there, she must deal with a mysterious contamination, disappearing colleagues, a deadly animal and a being known as the Crawler, all while searching for clues regarding her husband’s disappearance.

Garland wrote the script adapting the book, which hit stores February 2014 and is part of a trilogy. The scribe, who wrote 28 Days Later and The Beach, is finding himself to be in high demand thanks to the surprise success of Ex Machina.

Paramount had no comment on Portman’s dealmaking.

THR