Preview: The Hughes Brothers’ THE BOOK OF ELI

By Norm Schrager at February 28, 2009 | 8:19 am | Print

How many times has the phrase “post-apocalyptic thriller” been used to describe a movie? Probably too many, with widely varying results. Yet, here comes another, The Book of Eli, with a Denzel Washington-led cast that sounds solid, a return by the once-celebrated Hughes Brothers, and a first-time script by a self-professed videogame geek named Gary Whitta. Will we get the ingenuity of the Hughes’ Menace II Society, the excess of failed movies like The Postman, or something else?

Here’s the most recent photo from The Book of Eli, released this week by Entertainment Weekly.

In the film — now this isn’t a spoiler — the world has suffered an apocalpyse. Go figure. Washington plays Eli, a “lone man” as the notes describe him (sounds familiar), a guy battling his way across the country to protect a book containing the secrets to mankind’s future existence.

If this sounds like a first-person-shooter videogame, you can thank Gary Whitta. The screenwriter once edited PC Gamer magazine, has consulted on some big-name game titles, and is responsible for the Death, Jr. comic books with Hellboy master (and Disney’s Atlantis illustrator) Mike Mignola. Whether that love of heroic sci-fi can translate well into a feature remains to be seen. Whitta does have a personal blog that hasn’t been updated since 2007 — but here he shares his excitement over selling the Book of Eli script.

The Book of Eli Teaser Movie Poster

How Whitta’s futuristic Western will look and feel is up to the Hughes Brothers. Twin brothers Albert and Allen Hughes were once The Next Big Thing (“Things” I guess?) after Menace II Society rose to the cream of the crop in the early 1990s glut of films about inner city black men’s troubles. Their ambitious follow-up, Dead Presidents, was in 1995, followed by the much-acclaimed documentary American Pimp (1999) (currently in development as the fictional ”Gentlemen of Leisure” at HBO).Although Allen directed a segment of New York, I Love You (2008), the Hughes haven’t helmed a feature together since the Jack the Ripper thriller From Hell nearly eight years ago.

:: CAST: In addition to Washington, Gary Oldman, Mila Kunis (so great in Forgetting Sarah Marshall), Jennifer Beals, Michael Gambon

:: RELEASE DATE: January 15, 2010

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