Pulitzer Prize-Winning Novel ‘The Goldfinch’ to be Adapted Into Movie

After months of negotiations, Warner Bros. and partner RatPac Entertainment have closed a deal to bring Donna Tartt’s bestselling novel The Goldfinch to the big screen. RatPac is of course the production company owned by director Brett Ratner (Tower Heist, X-Men: The Last Stand), who will serve as a producer here, alongside Nina Jacobson and Brad Simpson of Color Force.

The novel debuted last fall and was met with resounding praise from critics before picking up the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. Amazon also named it its novel of the year for 2013. The story, which reads as modern day Charles Dickens, is about a 13 year-old boy in Manhattan who, after surviving a bombing at the Metropolitan Museum of Art that kills his mother, escapes with the painting by Carel Fabritius named The Goldfinch. The boy then keeps the painting with him in secret as, over the course of the next two decades, his life takes several unexpected turns. Because of the scope of the story, it was originally shopped to studios as a mini-series, thoughtWarner Bros. seems focused on making it into a single feature film. It’s the third novel from Tartt, whose debut work, The Secret History, was also optioned by Warner Bros. years ago, but has yet to make it to the silver screen.

There is no word yet on who will write the adaptation, and though Ratner is a director, the man behind the recent Hercules movie probably isn’t the right creative choice for this type of project. Ratner and his company RatPac Entertainment have been active lately, setting up the Hank Williams biopic I Saw the Light, as well as the crime thriller Missing You, which will also be based at Warner Bros.