William Gibson’s Neuromancer (wiki) was released in 1984 and quickly became one of the most influential science-fiction novels ever. It helped popularize the term cyberpunk and became a seminal work for a whole subgenre, inspiring later works such as The Matrix, Ghost in the Shell, and the Deus Ex video games. Strangely, there hasn’t been a movie adaptation yet. Chuck Russell, Joseph Kahn, and Vincenzo Natali all tried making it into a movie at some point, but mysteriously all of them failed to succeed. Neuromancer meant constant development hell. Natali (Cube, Splice) worked on it for the last five years, even managing to develop a Gibson approved screenplay.
British production company GFM has now given up on Natali and his vision. Instead they decided to join arms with the C2M Media Group. The Chinese partners will provide the budget, and they already got an American producer on board: Lucas Foster who worked on Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Man on Fire, and Law-Abiding Citizen. What doesn’t look so hot is the fact that both GFM and C2M don’t seem to have much experience with genre fare. Or great talents. Or notable live action science-fiction flicks. GFM most notably co-produced the Simon Pegg comedy Absolutely Anything and the Toei Animation flick Space Pirate: Captain Harlock while C2M only produced two no-name Asian movies so far.
I guess you shouldn’t get your hopes up. This probably won’t ever be a worthy big budget, Roger Deakins filmed masterpiece. Regarding cyberpunk, you might have a better future with the upcoming Rupert Sanders / Scarlett Johansson adaptation of Ghost in the Shell, Scott Derrickson’s ongoing plans for a Deus Ex movie, the upcoming fourth Deus Ex game Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, and the upcoming video game Cyberpunk 2077 by the acclaimed creators of the The Witcher games.
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