Murray The Mayor

It seems as though Bill Murray has been cast as the wicked Mayor in Gil Kenan's adaptation of City of Ember. Variety also report that Toby Jones is in the cast, as well as Saoirse Ronan, who plays the younger version of Romola Garai's character in Atonement. Ronan is bound to be Lina Mayfleet, one of the two child leads, while Jones is likely to be Looper, a 'mysterious' thief.

The film is set to be shot in Belfast, which is an interesting choice. As the story takes place in an underground world with no natural light, I was imagining just about everything will be shot on sound stages and then I realised how big these sound stages would have to be, and I wasn't quite sure anymore. If they do shoot on location, everything will have to be shot after dark, of course.

Maybe Belfast is smoggy enough that starlight and the moon add only low levels of ambient interference? I doubt it, somehow.

Kenan did a very good job with Monster House and I'm very keen to see how he handles a totally different toolkit on his second feature. Hopefully he'll build on his promise - handled correctly (and so far, it seems it has been) a feature film of City of Ember could be a genuine family classic.

City Of Ember

Walden Media are to continue their fantasy-book adaptation streak by bringing City of Ember to the big screen. Jeanne DuPrau's post-apocalyptic mystery is the first in a series of three books, with at least a fourth to come, and Walden are, of course, hoping to have a franchise on their hands.

The setting is intriguing - a sealed-off city beneath the world's surface, lit only by articicial light.
In this first story, a time-capsule that gives escape instructions is planted, to open only when it will be safe to return to the world above.

Even more fascinating is the sequel, People of Sparks, that sees the Emberites return to the open space of the planet's surface, meeting the people of a village called Sparks. For her third installment, The Prophet of Yonwood, DuPrau wrote a prequel set in the lead-up to the massive war that drove the people underground. The fourth book is anticpated to be set after Sparks in the chronology, so I can imagine Yonwood getting bypassed or postponed if a series does indeed enter production.

[EDIT: Monster House's Gil Kenan is set to direct. That's great news. Attempts to raise funding/distribution will take place at Cannes]