"Independence Day: Resurgence" helmer Roland Emmerich is in early negotiations with Sony Pictures to direct the science-fiction thriller "Dark Matter." The said film will be based on the Blake Crouch bestseller novel of the same name.
According to Variety, "Dark Matter" was published in July by Crown Publishing Group. It centers on a college physics professor and a quantum physicist Jason Dessen in Chicago with a warm family life. Dessen once had a brilliant research career ahead of him but derailed after his girlfriend's unexpected pregnancy and the birth of a son.
In the plot of "Dark Matter," Dessen is abducted by a masked abductor into a world he does not know in which his quantum many-worlds theory has become a fully realized technology for interdimensional transfer, Deadline reported. In this parallel world, he did not marry his girlfriend, never had a son, and a celebrated genius who has achieved something remarkable and impossible.
As the story of "Dark Matter" progresses, Dessen is determined to get back to his other life. However, nefarious powers in the alternate reality conspire to stop him from revealing the criminal lengths they have gone to create the world-hopping technology.
Matt Tolmach is producing the movie version of "Dark Matter," and Sony Pictures bought the movie rights in 2014. When it made a pre-emptive $1.25 million deal for the book based on Crouch's 150-page partial manuscript, publishing rights at that time for North America sold to Crown for more than $1 million. Andrea Giannetti is overseeing the project for Columbia Pictures.
Crouch is the bestseller author of the "Wayward Pines" trilogy. The said trilogy was adapted last year into a Fox TV series of the same name.
Emmerich' recent credits include "Stonewall" (2015) and "White House Down" (2013). He last directed and produced "Independence Day: Resurgence," which is two decades after he directed the original "Independence Day." He also directed several big-budget sci-fi projects such as "The Day After Tomorrow," "2012," and "Stargate."
Watch the video about Blake Crouch, author of "Dark Matter," speaking at the PRH Library Marketing and Library Journal Author Breakfast in Chicago:
