A Head Full of Ghosts Now in Focus
Steve Barton
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Ghosts are still very much profitable and haunting at the box office, and another specter-filled tale is officially on its way. According to Deadline, Focus Features just won an auction for rights to adapt A Head Full of Ghosts, the upcoming thriller novel by Paul Tremblay.
William Morrow publishes the book next month. Focus prevailed in an auction that also had TriStar in hot pursuit. Deals are being closed for Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski to write the script and for Dan Dubiecki’s Allegiance Theater to produce with Team Downey, the shingle run by Robert Downey, Jr., and Susan Downey.
Book Synopsis:
A chilling thriller that brilliantly blends domestic drama, psychological suspense, and a touch of modern horror, reminiscent of Mark Z. Danielewski’s House of Leaves, John Ajvide Lindqvist’s Let the Right One In, and Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House.
The lives of the Barretts, a normal suburban New England family, are torn apart when fourteen-year-old Marjorie begins to display signs of acute schizophrenia.
To her parents’ despair, the doctors are unable to stop Marjorie’s descent into madness. As their stable home devolves into a house of horrors, they reluctantly turn to a local Catholic priest for help. Father Wanderly suggests an exorcism; he believes the vulnerable teenager is the victim of demonic possession. He also contacts a production company that is eager to document the Barretts’ plight. With John, Marjorie’s father, out of work for more than a year and the medical bills looming, the family members agree to be filmed and soon find themselves the unwitting stars of “The Possession,” a hit reality television show. When events in the Barrett household explode in tragedy, the show and the shocking incidents it captures become the stuff of urban legend.
Fifteen years later, a bestselling writer interviews Marjorie’s younger sister, Merry. As she recalls those long ago events that took place when she was just eight years old, long-buried secrets and painful memories that clash with what was broadcast on television begin to surface—and a mind-bending tale of psychological horror is unleashed, raising vexing questions about memory and reality, science and religion, and the very nature of evil.
Categorized:News
