Affleck, Fincher, Gillian Flynn Sign on to Remake Hitchcock's 'Strangers'

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The Gone Girl team of director David Fincher, screenwriter Gillian Flynn and actor Ben Affleck have already set their sights on their next project: Strangers, a modern take on Alfred Hitchcock's 1951 suspense classic Strangers on a Train, according to Deadline.


In the Hitchcock original, the plot revolves a murder pact between a tennis star (played by Farley Granger) and the titular stranger on a train (portrayed by Robert Walker). Aboard, they devise a plan to kill the source of each other's problems – the tennis star's ex-wife, the stranger's father – while establishing an alibi and leaving a wake of motiveless murder. The "plan" was just the tennis star humoring the stranger – but that doesn't stop Walker's character from killing the ex-wife and demanding Granger's straight-laced guy fulfill their deal.

In the planned contemporary remake, Granger's tennis player will be transformed into a movie star whose private plane breaks down during an Oscar campaign, forcing him to hop on board another jet owned by a wealthy stranger. Deadline reports that Affleck will play the role of the movie star in the film, which is an adaptation of a Patricia Highsmith novel.

However, this being Hollywood and Hitchcock, just because a film has been announced doesn't mean it will be made. A planned reboot of The Birds starring Naomi Watts had languished since it was first announced in 2007 before Michael Bay took the reins this past summer.

Also, when a Hitchcock remake is finally greenlighted, the results don't always approximate the original: Gus Van Sant's shot-for-shot Psycho, Doug Liman's high-octane Mr. and Mrs. Smith and the Rear Window retread Disturbia are among the films that failed to reach the high bar set by the Master of Suspense.

News of Strangers comes just days after Flynn revealed that there could be a Gone Girl sequel in the future.

http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/n...train-20150114