Ben Affleck was once a very busy man in Hollywood, but after experiencing a few personal battles, he took himself out of the spotlight and away from his many different film projects. And Batman, sadly.
Affleck has started to get himself back into the movie-making business though, recently starring in the films Triple Frontier and The Way Back, and now he’s stepping back into the writing and directing game as he has signed on to co-write and direct the adaptation of Keeper of the Lost Cities for Disney.
The movie is a rather surprising one for Affleck, given how most of his directorial efforts were dark dramas or crime capers, and not the type of thing you would typically expect to see from Disney. Perhaps taking on something a lot lighter will be a good fit for him now and I guess you can’t go wrong with getting into Disney’s good books.
Ironically, Affleck once directed a short film in 1993 titled, I Killed My Lesbian Wife, Hung Her on a Meathook, and Now I Have a Three Picture Deal at Disney. Let’s hope he didn’t have to do any of the aforementioned acts to get this contract with Disney.
As for the film, Keeper of the Lost Cities is based on the book series by Shannon Messenger and follows a 12-year-old girl named Sophie Foster who has the ability to read minds and discovers that she’s actually from a parallel universe. Affleck will be adapting this film alongside writer Kate Gritmon and considering that the novel has already spawned multiple books, there is plenty of room for further sequels if they can make a success out of this story.
I don’t know too much about the book series, but the premise certainly sounds intriguing and parallel universes are becoming a bigger thing thanks to some of the rumoured story directions for Marvel and DC movies and so, if they can do a good job in handling a story of this nature, they could definitely tap into the right audience.
There is no set release date for this project yet, but it would be great to see Affleck step behind the camera again and bring his directorial style into something completely different.
Last Updated: January 12, 2021
