Pawel Pawlikowski's ‘The Island' is Unlikely to Get Made

Here’s an update on Pawel Pawlikowski’s “The Island,” and it’s not good news.

This past August, I reported that Pawlikowski was attempting to revive “The Island,” which was supposed to star Joaquin Phoenix and Rooney Mara, after bond companies were refusing to insure it ahead of the SAG strike. The project was scrapped right before the writer’s strike.

Pawlikowski’s go-to cinematographer, Łukasz Żal, now says that the film is unlikely to get made: "It’s terrible, because it’s an amazing story, a beautiful script." He adds that they “lost a lot of money because of the strike”. Here’s the full quote:

It was just two-and-a-half weeks before shooting. And then, you know, we lost a lot of money because our production designer built a lot of roads because everything was very-hard-to-access terrain. So he built little roads, gates, bridges. So that’s a huge amount of people working on that. And then on a Friday the co-production called and said, “We have to stop immediately.” They lost so much money and now we don’t have this money, basically. It’s a black-and-white film as well, so it’ll be hard to find this money now. It’s terrible, because it’s an amazing story, a beautiful script.

That’s something we didn’t know: the film was going to be shot in black and white. Pawlikowski’s last two films (“Ida” and “Cold War”) were also shot in black and white. Regardless, it doesn’t look like this one is moving forward.

Pawlikowski was told on the eve of production that the movie couldn’t be insured, leading to both Phoenix and Mara returning home and the project being put on hold until further notice. Producers tried other insurance companies but to no avail. However, based on what I had heard, there had been positive developments in reviving the project. Pawlikowski still very much wanted this to be his next movie. Has he given up?

Described as a drama/thriller, “The Island” is loosely based on real events. Mara and Phoenix play an American couple in the 1930s who escape to their own private island and live off the land. However, a millionaire disrupts their tranquil lifestyle, as he passes by on his yacht, turning the couple into a tabloid sensation.

Pawlikowski’s last two films, “Ida” and “Cold War,” were critically-acclaimed chrome-infused sensations. There was a lot of high expectations for this next one. Before his last two critical hits, Pawlikowski had also directed the wonderful 2004 coming-of-age romance “My Summer of Love.”