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Netflix Acquires George Orwell’s ‘Animal Farm’; Andy Serkis Directs & Matt Reeves Produces

Andy sure is making rounds as being a director lately. I hope it's good


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Days after acquiring his film Mowgli from Warner Bros, Netflix has doubled down with Andy Serkis by acquiring rights to the George Orwell novel Animal Farm. Serkis will direct a performance-capture film. 6th & Idaho’s Matt Reeves, Rafi Crohn and Adam Kassan will produce with The Imaginarium’s Serkis and Jonathan Cavendish.

The Netflix deal reunites Serkis with Reeves after they worked together on Dawn of the Planet of the Apes and War for the Planet of the Apes. Reeves made an overall Netflix deal in January.

Netflix
Orwell’s allegorical novella was published in 1945, and the author said it was informed by the Russian revolution of 1917 and the subsequent Stalinist regime of the Soviet Union. If you didn’t read it in school, the premise involves a group of animals who rebel against the humans who own their farm and win their independence. The architects of the revolution create a utopian environment based on equality, but a pig named Napoleon twists the original intent, slowly eliminates his rivals and enacts seven commandments — the basic of which declares that “all animals are created equal, but some animals are more equal than others.”

Serkis and Cavendish have wanted to make this movie for years, and Serkis originally planned to play a role in the film when the Imaginarium first made a rights deal with the George Orwell Estate in 2012.

“We are incredibly excited to have finally found the perfect creative home in Netflix for this extraordinarily zeitgeist work by George Orwell,” Serkis said in a statement. “On top of that, to be re-united with my great friend Matt Reeves — with his acute sensitivity, storytelling intelligence and honesty and command in this realm — is to have the very best scenario for our long-held passion to bring this fable alive.”

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Cavendish said the intention is to bring “Animal Farm to the screen in a thoroughly contemporary fashion, which will highlight the staggering relevance today of the satirical and dramatic power of Orwell’s re-imagined classic.”

Said Reeves: “Andy is such an incredible artist — he is truly a force of nature and a beautiful soul. To be able to work with him again and with Jonathan and Netflix to see Orwell’s classic tale brought to life in a totally new and exciting way is an absolute dream.”

Orwell’s estate was repped by literary executor Bill Hamilton of A.M. Heath, St. John Donald of United Agents and Phil Rymer of Lewis Silkin. The Imaginarium is repped by John Garvey of CAA, Larry Taube of Principal Entertainment and Pam Black of Ziffren Brittenham, and Reeves is with CAA, 3 Arts and Jackoway Tyerman.
 
The original Animal Farm novel is fantastic. But I feel the made for TV versions have been done to death. I have seen at least 3 made for TV versions. And I am sure there are more.
 

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
The original Animal Farm novel is fantastic. But I feel the made for TV versions have been done to death. I have seen at least 3 made for TV versions. And I am sure there are more.

But you have yet to see it with the... wait for it... Trump injected angle. ;)
 

pr0cs

Member
Could be very good and seems appropriate given the increasing climate of hostility to capitalism and the perceived love of socialism
 

Papa

Banned
Given Netflix's embrace of social justice orthodoxy, this is possibly the most Orwellian thing ever :LOL:
 

Gander

Banned
I keep hoping Netflix will pick up a D & D story-line to bring forth. They have the money to really go in-depth, use the lore and details.
 
S

SLoWMoTIoN

Unconfirmed Member
Red scare from its close cousin? Huh. I read this as a teen so this makes more sense!
 

mckmas8808

Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
It’s an analogy about the USSR. Farm animals overthrow the farm owner (representing the Romanovs) and establish their own form of government.

WHOA! That sounds interesting! So it's like talking animals and stuff right?
 

DKehoe

Gold Member
WHOA! That sounds interesting! So it's like talking animals and stuff right?

Yup, a lot of the characters represent historical figures. So there’s a Marx/Lenin analogue, Stalin, Trotsky, Hitler, Churchill etc. It’s pretty short so you could blast right through it pretty quickly.

Red scare from its close cousin? Huh. I read this as a teen so this makes more sense!

I guess I'd say it's like a warning about how easily revolutions with good intent can be manipulated by people into becoming totalitarian regimes that are more like what they overthrew than what the initial intent was.
 
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mckmas8808

Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
Yup, a lot of the characters represent historical figures. So there’s a Marx/Lenin analogue, Stalin, Trotsky, Hitler, Churchill etc. It’s pretty short so you could blast right through it pretty quickly.
.

Awesome. So do we know if this will be a CGI movie or will it be like Planet of the Apes?
 

DunDunDunpachi

Patient MembeR
It's a good read. Leagues better than 1984, in my opinion. The allegory holds up much better today, especially if you know the history of the figures represented by the animals. Quite a short book, too!

We should also be reading Fahrenheit 451. It speaks much more directly to our current culture of mob-censorship and neighbor tattling.
 

Jesus Carbomb

From Water into Guinness
Andy Serkis is getting more work than Peter Jackson these days. That Hobbit trilogy really must have sucked the soul right out of him.
 

Spheyr

Banned
I keep hoping Netflix will pick up a D & D story-line to bring forth. They have the money to really go in-depth, use the lore and details.
I want an Elminster series. Hollywood gave us the absolute perfect to a T actor to play a young, whiny, spoiled, idiot just realizing his place in the world once he doesn't have his princedom to protect him from the world.

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