Amblin Entertainment’s Micro movie will adapt Michael Crichton’s final published novel
With Westworld a major hit on HBO and a sequel to Jurassic World on track to hit the big screen next summer, the work of Michael Crichton is still making an impact on the world nearly a decade after the author’s passing. Today, Deadline has an update on a project that has been in development for some time with the report that Amblin Entertainment‘s Micro movie, set to adapt Crichton’s final published novel, has found a director. According to the outlet, Joachim Rønning, who helms next month’s Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, has entered negotiations to bring the Micro movie to the big screen.
The high-concept thriller follows a group of graduate students lured to Hawaii to work for a mysterious biotech company—only to find themselves miniaturized and cast out into the rain forest, with nothing but their scientific expertise and wits to protect them.
Micro was unfinished when Michael Crichton passed away in 2008, but was later completed by author Richard Preston and published by HarperCollins in 2011. It was a New York Times bestseller and spent over 20 weeks combined on the list in hardcover and paperback.
“We are so pleased to have this opportunity to develop ‘Micro,”” said Steven Spielberg when the rights were acquired two years ago. “For Michael, size did matter whether it was for ‘Jurassic’s’ huge dinosaurs or ‘Micro’s’ infinitely tiny humans.”
“Michael was exhilarated, passionate and invested in ‘Micro,’ a story he spent years researching and developing,” added Sherri Crichton. “It was yet another opportunity for him to explore the clash between science and nature, as seen through the eyes of relatable characters. Michael also wrote in cinematic terms and would be so pleased to see ‘Micro’ come to life on the big screen at DreamWorks.”
Frank Marshall will produce the Micro movie alongside Sherri Crichton and Laurent Bouzereau.
