James Franco has been interested in adapting Cormac McCarthy’s Child of God for some time now, probably because his goal of shooting Blood Meridian proved to be too ambitious (or really, because the deal just fell through – at least for the time being). Whether or not he has Blood Meridian in mind still, Showbiz411 seems confident that James Franco is already down in West Virginia directing and starring in his adaption of Child of God.
The only other information that we currently have about the project is that it will costar Tim Blake Nelson and “a number of West Virginia locals” and that Franco says the shoot is going “extremely well” and he is excited to see the results. Now that I know that this sucker is in motion, I can say that I am extremely excited to see this as well.
For those unfamiliar with Child of God, it is one of McCarthy’s most bizarre stories. In fact, if you had asked me which of McCarthy’s novels that I would think would be the last to be adapted for the big screen (and I’ve read them all), this would have been the one I singled out. The story follows a murderous sexual predator – with very few redeeming characteristics – named Lester Ballard as he takes on the life of a cave dwelling nomad in the mountains of Tennessee. As he spends more time in isolation, his lust for blood and deviant sex only increase – and I will leave it at that.
I highly recommend you read the source before the film comes out. I insist. So, buy the paperback right here or the Kindle edition right here. Or just check it out at your local library. Books are free there, you know. I’m pretty excited to see the direction that Franco takes this film. I can really see no way of sugarcoating the story or playing down the deviant and dysfunctional nature of Lester without lessening the impact of the story.
Soon enough, I reckon, we will find out.
EDIT: By the way, I am convinced that Tim Blake Nelson is going to be playing the lead of Lester Ballard, not Franco. This isn’t confirmed either way at present, but Nelson is too perfect of a fit for it not to be him.
The indulgent 800-page books that were written a hundred years ago are just not going to be written anymore and people need to get used to that. If you think you’re going to write something like ‘The Brothers Karamazov’ or ‘Moby-Dick,’ go ahead. Nobody will read it. I don’t care how good it is, or how smart the readers are. Their intentions, their brains are different.
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Cormac McCarthy, The Wall Street Journal, Nov. 20, 2009
From the album The Last Pale Light in the West by Ben Nichols (of Lucero), which is a collection of songs inspired by Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian. Be sure to check out The Kid as well.
The Wall Street Journal’s Amy Chozick conducts what has to rank up there among the ranks of the most awkward actor interviews. While reading it, I could hear Tommy Lee Jones’s voice and picture his apathetic look. It’s equally amusing and painful to read.
Full trailer: Cormac McCarthy’s The Sunset Limited
The adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s The Sunset Limited premieres Saturday, February 12 (9:00-10:30 p.m. ET/PT) on HBO.
I don’t think goodness is something that you learn. If you’re left adrift in the world to learn goodness from it, you would be in trouble.
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Cormac McCarthy (2009)
My perfect day is sitting in a room with some blank paper. That’s heaven. That’s gold and anything else is just a waste of time. … Anything that doesn’t take years of your life and drive you to suicide hardly seems worth doing.
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Cormac McCarthy, WSJ interview (2009)
The man smiled at him a sly smile. As if they knew a secret between them, these two. Something of age and youth and their claims and the justice of those claims. And of their claims upon them. The world past, the world to come. Their common transciencies. Above all a knowing deep in the bone that beauty and loss are one.
I'm a writer, teacher, and student in rural Pennsylvania. Sometimes I blog. This is my stream of consciousness - a self-serving archive of musings, music, food, snippets of what I've been reading, and whatever else captures my interest.
