David Lowery has become one of the busiest people in Hollywood thanks to his 2013 feature film debut, Ain’t Them Bodies Saints. The visually poetic drama starring Casey Affleck and Rooney Mara fared pretty well with critics, and landed the director a few new jobs when it premiered at Sundance.
Currently, he is set to write and direct a handful of upcoming films, including The Old Man and the Gun starring Robert Redford, the former David Fincher project Torso, the science fiction film Two starring Casey Affleck, and an adaptation of The Yellow Birds. He’ll also be producing Alex Ross Perry’s Listen Up Philip, and recently directed an episode of Rectify’s second season.
As if that weren’t enough, the director has just been attached to another project, Disney’s remake of Pete’s Dragon. The original 1977 movie tells the story of a lonely orphan boy and his magic, invisible dragon, who runs away from his abusive foster family. Lowrey will co-write the film with frequent collaborator Toby Halbrooks, and the two will reportedly re-invent the core of the story and drop the musical elements of the original.
At this point in time, that’s all we really know about the movie, though it does raise a couple of questions. The first thing that comes to mind is whether or not we need a remake of Pete’s Dragon, or if modern audiences would be interested in it. The other puzzling thing about this news is where Lowrey plans to fit this into his already packed schedule.
We’ll be sure to keep you posted when we hear more but for now, tell us, do you think this remake is a good idea?