According to Variety, Netflix is developing a feature adaptation of “Hatchet,” Gary Paulsen’s 1987 young adult survival novel, and the guy they got to make it is Derek Cianfrance.
Cianfrance will write and direct. If you grew up in the ’90s, you probably read “Hatchet” in school. Or at least many did. The story follows 13-year-old Brian Robeson, who survives a plane crash and ends up stranded alone in the Canadian wilderness with nothing but the hatchet his mom gave him. Paulsen turned it into a five-book series.
Paulsen’s estate actually kept the rights off the market for years, and it was involved in picking Cianfrance to lead the project. This probably means they don’t want a slick, CGI-heavy survival movie. They wanted a real filmmaker.
Cianfrance broke out with “Blue Valentine” (2010), an acclaimed indie portrait of a marriage falling apart, starring Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams. He followed that with “The Place Beyond the Pines” (2012), a sprawling generational crime saga with Gosling, Bradley Cooper and Ben Mendelsohn. Then came “The Light Between Oceans” (2016) with Michael Fassbender, Alicia Vikander and Rachel Weisz, an old-fashioned weepie that rang too false. He also earned an Oscar nomination for co-writing “Sound of Metal,” a project he’d been developing for years before handing it off to Darius Marder.
Which leads us to “Roofman,” released last year, Cianfrance’s first film in almost ten years. That film, which undeperformed at the box office, and had no awards push, deserved a better fate. Channing Tatum gave the best performance of his career as Jeffrey Manchester, the Army vet turned McDonald’s robber who escaped prison and secretly lived inside a Toys “R” Us for six months. Kirsten Dunst was terrific opposite him, and the chemistry between those two was the heart of the whole thing. It was funny, sad and genuinely moving.
“Roofman” proved Cianfrance could loosen up and make something accessible without losing the melancholy that runs through all his work. If you still haven’t this gem of a film, it’s well worth a look.
Now, if Netflix lets Cianfrance shoot “Hatchet” the way he wants and doesn’t overproduce it (please, not a green-screen, two-hour, algorithm-friendly survival flick), this could turn out really good. There’s potential, and giving Cianfrance some creative freedom is necesarry. So, Netflix, please don’t screw this up.
Universal has dropped the first trailer for "River," the Joshua Giuliano slasher that became TIFF 2026's biggest sale when Jason Blum and Universal paid $10M+ for it in September.