Having turned down the TWILIGHT sequel NEW MOON after directing the first film, director Catherine Hardwicke (pictured) instead jumped into a darker-sounding genre project: an updated take on the Little Red Riding Hood story, which has now been given the green light by Warner Bros.

Screen Daily reports that the film, titled THE GIRL WITH THE RED RIDING HOOD, will be lensed in Vancouver this summer. Leonardo Di Caprio’s Appian Way company is producing, and the script was written by ORPHAN’s David Leslie Johnson and THE ASTRONAUT’S WIFE’s Rand Ravich. “We’re making it a wild, thrilling mystery in this great Gothic fairy tale setting,” Hardwicke tells the trade. “It’s very sexy, romantic and scary. I get to create a whole world.” The director has said she wants JENNIFER’S BODY’s Amanda Seyfried take the title role, but no casting has been confirmed yet.

As for why she walked away from NEW MOON, she explained, “I never wanted to [direct it]. The only way it could have worked was if I had time to actually dream up some cool stuff that would make me want to do it. But Summit did not want to wait, which I understand.” GIRL WITH THE RED RIDING HOOD is budgeted at slightly higher than TWILIGHT’s $37 million; stay tuned for further updates.

 

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