When The Vow came out last year it was a big surprise hit, not only beating Safe House, Journey 2: The Mysterious Island and Star Wars Episode I 3D in its opening weekend, but maintaining its popularity over a 14 week run and managing to make a total of $125 million domestically. Hollywood logic dictates that these kinds of numbers mean people just love romantic movies about memory loss - hence we get news about this new project.
The Hollywood Reporter has learned that The Sessions director Ben Lewin is now setting up his follow-up to his Oscar nominated Sundance hit, and is doing so by teaming up with Katherine Heigl for the new film A Moment To Remember. Based on a Japanese series called Pure Soul, the new movie will have the One For The Money star playing a fashion designer "who is stricken with a disease that wipes away her memory, forcing her husband to desperately try to give her one last memory of their love." The show has already been adapted as a moie in Korea, and there was a point when CBS Films was going to do an English-language remake of it. However, plans fell through and the project was put into turnaround.
Prior to making The Sessions, Lewin had been absent from the film industry for years, his previous feature being the 1994 romantic comedy Paperback Romance. The trade doesn't mention if he will be writing the script as well, but it would stand to reason given that he wrote all of the previous titles he directed. Production on A Moment To Remember is expected to start in the late spring.
Heigl will next be seen in The Big Wedding, which will be out in April.
