Fishburne to Write/Direct Alchemist Flick

Variety broke the news yesterday afternoon: Laurence Fishburne is adapting The Alchemist, the Paulo Coelho “adventure novel” that has become 21st-century America’s Jonathan Livingston Seagull, for a big-screen Warner Bros. release. Fishburne has already written the screenplay, and is also expected to direct the film—insert your own “red pill/blue pill” jokes here. Now let’s see Coelho complain that nobody in America appreciates him… although there’s no guarantee the flick will actually succeed. The box office for adaptations of other prominent metaphysical novels like The Celestine Prophecy and Peaceful Warrior, as recorded by IMDb, isn’t exactly encouraging, and let’s not forget the drubbing The Fountain took from critics and audiences. On the other hand, you might retort, What the #$*! Do We Know?

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