After Peter Jackson and Andy Serkis completed their work together on the Lord of the Rings movies, it came as a surprise to nobody when they decided to reteam for the director's remake of King Kong. The combination of WETA's digital abilities and Serkis' acting skills has twice resulted in some of the best CGI the world has ever seen. Later this summer, we will witness the third movie that the company and actor have worked together on in the form of Rise of the Planet of the Apes, and now director Rupert Wyatt seems to be hooked on the possibilities as well.
The print version of Empire (as spotted by The Playlist) has revealed that Serkis and Wyatt may soon be working on a motion-capture adaptation of the George Orwell classic Animal Farm. The novel, which serves as an allegory for the rise of Joseph Stalin in the Soviet Union, features a group of animals on a farm who decide to lead a revolt against their owner and take over the farm. Upon taking control, a pig named Napoleon begins to rewrite history, use propaganda, and give himself more power while taking power away from everyone else. The book has been adapted twice previously, the first being the 1954 UK animated film and the second a live-action version from 1999. Serkis also has a second mo-cap performance coming to theaters this year, playing Captain Haddock in The Adventures of Tintin: The Legend of the Unicorn.
With the proper amount of time dedicated to the CGI, this could actually be fantastic. Obviously that means that even if they were to start production tomorrow it would still be years away, but this has the potential to be the greatest adaptation yet. Now we just have to wait to see if Rise of the Planet of the Apes is any good before we decide if Wyatt is the right man for the helm.
