Here, we like Doug Liman, and the filmography he’s built over the years. The guy doesn’t follow the path — he clears his own. From “Swingers” to “The Bourne Identity,” to the wonderfully chaotic “Go” and “Edge of Tomorrow,” and the underrated “American Made,” Liman has always flirted with action and control in equal measure.
So when word comes down (via THR) that Liman’s partnering with Paramount to bring Stephen King’s “The Stand” to the big screen, something had to be written about it.
Yes, “The Stand.” King’s apocalyptic novel, all 1,152 pages of it. A behemoth. A Mount Everest of tales that Hollywood has tried, and mostly failed, to make for decades. Everyone from George A. Romero to Ben Affleck took a shot and either backed away or got lost in the climb. Two mini-series happened, sure (the 1994 one still has its defenders), but the feature film? Untouched. Untouchable, really. Until now.
Liman is set to direct. His new take on The Stand, sources say, is a one-and-done adaptation. No multi-part “event saga,” no streaming bloat. One film. One vision. That’s bold. Maybe insane. Probably both.
But that’s what makes Liman the right kind of crazy for this. His career has been a zigzag of genre reinvention. He made “Mr. and Mrs. Smith,” albeit, one of his weaker films, feel like espionage therapy. Even last year’s “Road House” remake — for all its streaming gloss — had a bruised-knuckle charm that made it more watchable than it had any right to be.
So why not let the man take a swing at the most ambitious thing King ever wrote?
For more almost fifty years, Hollywood has mined Stephen King’s work with wildly uneven results. Frank Darabont managed the rare hat trick with three great adaptations, while Kubrick famously torched King’s original vision for “The Shining,” and in doing so, created a horror landmark. Ditto De Palma with “Carrie.” But “The Stand”? that one’s always been the holy grail — the one project no one could quite crack.