Here's a tip for you, kids. If you want to get a break in the movies in the current climate, write yourself a halfway decent novel. That, at least, has been the route taken by Roger Hobbs, whose debut novel The Ghostman** won't even be published in the US until later this year, but has just been snapped up by Warner Bros for a seven figure sum.
The precociously talented and appallingly young Hobbs wrote The Ghostman at college while he should have been out drinking and talking to girls. The story that the disgustingly accomplished 23-year-old came up with involves Jack Delton, who lives a quiet life, precisely to avoid his dark past catching up with him.
Except, obviously, that all goes wrong when his ex-partner comes to him with news of a casino heist gone murderously wrong, and a dangerous crackhead missing while in posession of a stolen million bucks. And that's not going down too well with sinister villain The Wolf. And Jack has 24 hours to sort things out. And it might be a set-up.
Warner' Kevin McCormack, who's recently been busy with Gangster Squad and The Thin Man, will produce the film. No other talent is attached as yet, but Variety has word that Paul Haggis has expressed an interest. Hobb has also scored a first-look screenplay deal with Warners, so expect to hear more of his name in the reasonably near future.