In a pact guaranteed to raise both eyebrows and hackles, Gus Van Sant has teamed up with Brett Easton Ellis to write The Golden Suicides, based on the true story of the double suicide of artists Jeremy Blake and Theresa Duncan.
Blake and Duncan were popular New York Artists who, for reasons unknown, became increasingly paranoid that they were being conspired against by the US government and the church of Scientology. Duncan overdosed on Tylenol in July 2007, and Blake is believed to have drowned himself in the Atlantic a week later.
The film stems from a Vanity Fair article by Nancy Jo Sales, and the subject seems to fit perfectly with Van Sant's "Death Trilogy" of Gerry (David Coughlin), Elephant (Columbine) and Last Days (Kurt Cobain) although at this point he's only attached as a writer and not as a director.
Ellis' (American Psycho, The Rules of Attraction) involvement is less of an immediately obvious fit, although his fondness for mixing the bleak with the absurd might be an indication of the direction this is headed.
Among the production companies involved is Palm Star, who had a hand in s.Darko. But we're sure it'll be fine...