Summary
Stephen Kingfans might find themselves rejoicing sooner rather than later as the legendaryhorrorauthor is reportedly in the midst of terminating Warner Bros.' copyright license for his iconic 1994 prison drama film,The Shawshank Redemption, which, so happens to be 30 years since the movie was first released.
Written and directed by Frank Darabont, whose other works includeThe Green Mile, The Mist, andthe first season of AMC’sThe Walking Dead,The Shawshank Redemptionwas based onStephen King’s 1982 book, and has since remained one of the author’s most popular novels as well as films among his dedicated fanbase. Starring Andy Dufresne, played by Tim Robbins, the movie’s plotline follows Dufresne, who is sentenced to life in a corrupt and dehumanizing prison for the murder of his wife. However, life is made a little easier when he forms a close friendship with fellow inmate Ellis “Red” Redding (Morgan Freeman). As popular as the movie is, it didn’t do so well at the box office upon its theatrical release, taking in only $16 million. Regardless,The Shawshank Redemptionwent on to win seven Academy Award nominations, which saw the film then get a re-release in cinemas, increasing the film’s box-office total to $73.3 million.
A Shawshank Redemption Reboot Could Be on the Way
“Stephen King’s lawyers have notified Warner Bros. that he will be terminating the copyright license for The Shawshank Redemption, one of my favorite movies.“Matthew Belloni reported.“I hope this doesn’t mean he’s gonna set up a new movie or TV series elsewhere. King is pretty aggressive about terminations, Puck’s Eriq Gardner tells me, which makes sense given how robust the market continues to be for adaptations of his books.”
Even though most people’s first guess would be that due to King taking the adaptation rights toThe Shawshank Redemptionfrom Warner Bros. that it means he’s definitely planning a new movie, but it could be something simpler, like the rights have now become available to reclaim after the allocated time has passed, and he merely wants to hold onto them to resell at a later date.
It’s also fair to say that, due to the film’s iconic status as one, if not thebest King adaptationever, he wouldn’t be short on takers and likely in no rush to see another reboot, since there are so many of his in the pipeline, which includeThe Life of Chuck,The Long Walk, andThe Running Manthis year alone. Not to mention his 1974 novelCarrie, which isbeing adapted into a TV series by Mike Flanagan. However, some King fans might not be too happy with aShawshankreboot, given that the classic is already a brilliant film.
