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Gates of Fire (2004?)
Plot: Based on the book by Steven Presfield. The story of a famous battle between the Spartans and Persians at Thermopylae – a narrow pass to the Spartan homeland, hence the book’s name.
News:
30 January, 2002
Michael Mann is still thinking about making Gates of Fire. Speaking to Empire Online he says, "I might do it, yes. I just got the screenplay. I brought it here, I haven’t read it yet."
That answer might not sound like great enthusiasm but listen to the research he's been doing. "There was a Classics professor I brought in from Yale and I sat him down over two days and said, 'I’m in Sparta, it’s six o’clock in the morning, the sun comes up, I wake up... What kind of bed am I sleeping on? What’s on my body? Do I wash? Where am I? What part of a house? What is the house? What’s on the floor? Who is that woman? Is she my girlfriend? Is she my wife? Is she somebody else’s wife? What do I put on my feet when I get out? What kind of decoration is there? How do I view the material world?'"
Clearly he's intrigued by these people. "How and why these people of Thermopylae — I’ve just learned how to pronounce that word — stopped the Persians for three days is extraordinary. It was a people’s army that defeated the Persians, ultimately. It wasn’t the elite in the military that did it. Some of that is what I find fascinating about it. But it will only work as a film if you can make it into a personal experience," he said.
What do you think? Talk about it on the Forums
21 January, 2000
Tom Hanks and director Michael Mann are teaming up to make a film about the power struggle between Julius Caesar and Pompey the Great for control of the Roman Empire. Hanks is so far listed only as a producer. The script is currently being written by John Orloff. They are in talks with Disney as the likely distributor.
The movie will follow Caesar as his military successes make him more and more powerful in the empire. He realizes that the Senate will look to have him executed to stop his meteoric rise. This forces him to begin a bloody civil war that pits him against his friend and mentor, Pompey. Personally I would love to see this movie made. There is a great story to be told here and I'm surprised it hasn't been done earlier.
Mann has also agreed to develop Steven Pressfield's novel Gates of Fire as a movie. That novel tells of the 300 Spartans who held off an army of 50,000 Persians at the Battle of Thermopylae in Greece.
What do you think of this project? Tell everyone in our Forums.
