〉The longform narrative article was published in Atavist Magazine.
Empires of the Deep is a massive US-China co-production film that has endured years of script re-writes, crew changes, and fiascos. Its origin began in 2006 and has yet to find distribution, becoming something of a legend. Writer Mitch Moxley traveled to Beijing to document the production of the film and this trip resulted in SUNK, a longform narrative article written for Atavist Magazine, shedding light on the numerous problems that plagued the film.
Originally published this year, the lengthy and captivating original article reads like a mystery, with Moxley in the role of Sherlock Holmes as he tries to discover why this film, the brainchild of real estate billionaire Jon Jiang, has never been able to find success. It details the various stages of the film, including going through four directors, ten scriptwriters, with many of the cast and crew still unpaid as the film struggles to find distribution, four years after the first trailer appeared online. Yet according to Moxley’s article, Jiang is still determined to see this movie get released and succeed, comparing it to James Cameron’s Avatar.
Sunk includes excerpt’s from Empires’ script, interviews with the four directors who attempted to take control of the shoot, such as Jonathan Lawrence, who in 2010, walked on set to find a mere 20 extras and costumes that looked like bad Halloween outfits. It’s a story that has to be read to be believed and proves that truth really is stranger than fiction.
This is what makes this piece appealing for a film or television adaptation. It’s an absurd, real-life story like The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) and about an industry which audiences find endlessly fascinating: showbiz. It has the potential to be a great Hollywood comedy, similar to Tropic Thunder (2008) while also still touching on very real problems and setbacks in the movie industry.
The rights to the article are co-owned by Moxley and Atavist Magazine, with representation by David Patterson at Stuart Krichevsky. Jon Cassir at CAA is handling the film and TV rights.
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