Poe chiller TELL TALE is setup by the Scott's

By Matt Holmes / June 25, 2011

There's several of Edgar Allen Poe's works currently in movie development (including some biopic's of the guy which a number of director's have tentative plans for) and thanks to today's article in The Hollywood Reporter, we can add one more project to that list. Scott Free Productions, the production company ran by brothers Tony and Ridley Scott are setting up Tell Tale, a modern day reimagining of the classic Poe chiller Tell-Tale Heart which Michael Cuesta (Twelve and Holding) will be directing from a Dave Callaham (Doom) script.

It's a short story and readily available online if you want to give it a read. Here is just one of many places hosting the story which you can CLICK HERE TO READ.

It follows an unnamed narrator who insists on his sanity despite his murder of an old man with a vulture eye. The murder is carefully calculated and the murderer hides the body by cutting it into pieces and hiding it under the floorboards. Ultimately, the narrator's guilt manifests itself in the hallucination that the man's heart is still beating under the floorboards.

The film will be pre-strike, with casting now under-way on the $20 million picture which will shoot early next year. The short story is soooo short, it won't be an easy adaptation to the big screen and the idea of modernizing Poe's work is also a worry. Add an unproven director and a writer who contributed to the Doom script... and it's easy to have doubts over whether this can be done, though it's rich material that could make for a cool atmosphere. Here's the late-great Vincent Price re-telling the story some years ago. I love this tale but a full feature? I dunno...