Ben Affleck signs on to direct Stephen King’s ‘The Stand’

It seems ages since we last reported on the film adaptation of Stephen Kings The Stand, in fact it’s only been two months but then that’s an age in Hollywood.  Originally we reported that Harry Potter director David Yates was about to sign on as director (read our original report here).  However it seems that, that is no longer the case, instead we could be getting Ben Affleck.  So far Affleck has written and directed some pretty hard hitting films, covering topics such as child abduction and the criminal underworld in Gone Baby Gone and The Town respectively.  But with the rumours that The Stand could actually be a trilogy can he step up to the challenge?  The Stand is Kings epic story of an apocalyptic plague that sweeps across the globe leaving few survivors.  Those survivors form into two disparate groups, the good, under ‘Mother’ Abigail Freemantle, and the bad, under Randall ‘The Dark Man’ Flagg.  These two groups are inexorably drawn to each-other in a battle for the future of human-kind.  It’s an epic in every sense of the word, and even King has voiced his concerns that it’s unfilmable.  The previous TV series was a six hour toned down effort with a re-written script.  Here’s hoping that a full film trilogy will serve to keep the themes and impact of the novel, in a book the length of the bible Affleck certainly has a massive task ahead of him.  At this juncture that’s all we know about the matter, with no filming or release date even thought of yet it’s going to be some time until we start to see things take shape.

Source: Variety