Now that it's past bankruptcy is seems that MGM is finally on a bit of a roll. How can you say that? Because this is the second acquisition story that we've written about them today. Reports say that the studio has made moves to pick up the rights to the Russian sci-fi novel Metro 2033. The book was written by Dmitri Glukhovsky and the project will be produced by Mark Johnson, who is best known for The Chronicles of Narnia franchise and Galaxy Quest.
The plot is set in Moscow and follows the lives of the survivors of a global nuclear holocaust that has driven people to live underground. Set 20 years after the incident, a young boy named Artyom must travel to the Moscow Metro - the biggest air-raid shelter ever built - to warn the people there of a threat that could mean the end of humanity. Along his way he deals with "mutants, soldiers of a Fourth Reich and political factions of various metro stations in order to reach above ground."
F. Scott Frazier has been hired to adapt the story. While he doesn't have any credits out in theaters just yet - he previously worked as a video game evaluator - his first screenplay, The Numbers Station, has already gone through development and production. That film is directed by Kasper Barfoed and stars Malin Akerman and John Cusack.
THR, which broke the story, says that the book first came online in Russia in 2002 and was first published in 2005. It has been translated into 335 languages since and came to the United States in 2010. The property has already been turned into a video game, which was released by THR in 2010 for Xbox360 and PC.
