Roland Emmerich might not have had the best 2016, given that Independence Day: Resurgence was largely critically panned, and though it earned $389 million worldwide, is hasn't been considered a big success in an age when movies take in more than a billion, especially considering the huge impact of the original. Still, he's not shying away from sci-fi concepts, entering talks to direct the adaptation of Dark Matter for Sony.
Blake Crouch's book, which hit shelves in July, has become a bestseller, and was in fact snapped up by producer Matt Tolmach and the studio for a potential movie back in 2014 when it was still just a partial manuscript. The story follows quantum physicist Jason Dessen, who had been on the path to a brilliant research career. But then comes unexpected pregnancy, and a child he adores, so Dessen choses to focus on his loving family and a quiet job at a small Chicago college. Until he's snatched into a parallel world, once where his quantum theories about the multiverse were realised and there is the power to hop between dimensions. But though his life is full of success here, there's no family, and he fights to get back even as nefarious powers in the alternate world conspire to keep him, and stop him from revealing the criminal background to the world-changing tech...
We'll have to wait and see whether Emmerich actually ends up making the movie, but it certainly sounds like something he could bring to screens. The one question might be the title, which has been used for a couple of sci-fi movies and a SyFy Channel TV series, so that might alter on its journey.