If you're a relatively new director, how do you really know studio executives like your film before anyone outside of the company, some test screening audiences and a few members of the press have seen it? A good sign is being shoved to the front of the queue to handle one of the big franchises, which is why Chronicle** director Josh Trank should be feeling happy right now: Fox is considering him for its Fantastic Four reboot.
Variety reports that Trank has been having meetings on the studio’s planned move to bring a whole new cinematic version of Marvel’s squabbling superhero family to the screen. And while nothing is set in stone yet, he’s become the front-runner.
Though Chronicle is a low-budget drama, it’s not as big a leap as you might imagine, since it follows the misadventures of four friends who develop strange telekinetic powers after discovering something odd while on a trip. They initially love their newfound abilities, but things soon get more difficult. Hey, that sounds a bit Fantastic Four-y. We’d put it in terms of “with great power comes great responsibility” but someone else already uses that…
Fox, of course, pumped out two FF films in 2005 and 2007 with Tim Story at the helm and Chris Evans, Jessica Alba, Ioan Gruffudd and Michael Chiklis in the lead roles. But while they made money, they never quite reached the dizzy heights of, say, Iron Man or the first two X-Men outings. Plus, the company only holds on to the rights from Marvel provided it keeps making movies, so this has been in the works for a while.
It all sounds like the job is Trank’s to lose, though how Chronicle performs will also factor into it. The film arrives here on February 1.