French-American actress and filmmaker Anna Chazelle (Narrow, La La Land) is attached to direct The Trespassers, the feature adaptation of Elmore Leonard’s crime novel that was written in 1958 but was not published after the author’s death in 2013, according to Deadline.
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The story, adapted for the screen by Troy Blake, is told from the point of view of a young wife who becomes increasingly frustrated with her mild-mannered husband. When the husband refuses to confront some men who are illegally hunting on the couple’s remote homestead, his wife takes matters into her own hands.
The Trespassers will be produced by Leonard’s granddaughter Megan Freels Johnston through her Look At Me Films company, along with Nick Terry at Zero Gravity Management.
“The Trespassers is such a relevant story because whether it’s 1958 or today, many women can relate to the vulnerability of having to defend yourself against misogynistic men who have an expectation for getting what they want,” said Johnston.
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Chazelle will serve as the first woman director to helm a movie adaptation of Leonard’s work. Other adaptations include Rum Punch, aka Quentin Tarantino’s Jackie Brown, James Mangold’s 3:10 to Yuma, Steven Soderbergh’s Out of Sight, Barry Sonnenfeld’s Get Shorty, F. Gary Gray’s Be Cool, and John Frankenheimer’s 52 Pick-Up.
(Photo by Steve Granitz/WireImage via Getty Images)
