‘Sleight’ Director in Talks With Fox for ‘The Fly’ Remake

Most movie-going people are familiar with David Cronenberg’s The Fly, but not many fans are clued in to the fact that the film was a remake. The film was actually one of three different versions that first began with a short story written by George Langelaan. After the release of the short story, it was later adapted into a film by Director Kurt Neumann in 1958. About thirty years later, in 1986, Cronenberg released the first remake of the film version. Now once again, about thirty years later, Fox has Director J.D. Dillard in negotiations to direct and co-write The Fly, according to Deadline. Dillard recently made his feature debut co-writing and directing the film Sleight with his writing partner Alex Theurer, who will also write The Fly with Dillard.

The story is based on a scientist who mutates himself into a a grotesque and monstrous human fly. The Cronenberg remake starred Jeff Goldblum and Gina Davis. Cronenberg brought a lot of his personal aesthetic sensibilities to The Fly, which was a major factor in the success of the film. Dillard, on the other hand, is considerably green when it comes to directing features, and hasn’t necessarily established himself stylistically as a director. It’s a little worrying to see Fox reaching out to someone so new, but we hope that Dillard and Theurer go on to quiet those fears should they make the deal with Fox.

There were two sequels that followed Langelaan’s short, so if this film does well there’s potential for a franchise. Though it hasn’t been announced that that’s Fox’s plan.