The last time Christian Bale, director Brad Anderson and writer Scott Kosar got together, it was moider! Okay, no, it wasn’t. But that triple-headed collaboration did bring us The Machinist. And now it looks like the three could be reuniting for an adaptation of JG Ballard’s Concrete Island.
Talking with the team at Shock ‘Till You Drop, Anderson revealed his intention to get the movie made, admitting that, "It's sort of a crazy, cool Ballard-esque type story, but Christian's on board to do that when we can fit it into his schedule, of course."
Concrete Island is Ballard’s twisted take on Robinson Crusoe, one that sees wealthy architect Robert Maitland crashing off a motorway overpass in London on to a fenced-off wasteland squatting largely unnoticed in the big city. When he realises he’s both injured and effectively cut off, he starts having to survive on whatever was in his Jaguar and anything he can scrounge up from his bleak surroundings.
Though – spoiler alert, just in case – the “island” appears to be inhabited by other people, Maitland soon comes to the horrible realisation that he might just be living in a mirror of his own mind. And that’s only the tip of the iceberg…
Given the fluid nature of films in development, Anderson is careful to say that Bale is interested in the film, but has a busy schedule. Still, the chance to not only revisit Ballard’s work for the first time since 1987’s Empire of the Sun, work again with his Machinist team and put his body through physical hardship as the Maitland character suffers? Sounds like catnip to the Oscar-nominated actor…