Gemma Arterton in Chris Nolan-scripted Ruth Rendell thriller THE KEYS TO THE STREET?

Might the next Chris Nolan thriller actually be a case for a Ruth Rendell sleuth to solve, and not The Dark Knight?? Welllllll, kinda. Printed in yesterday's Sunday Times (found via The Playlist), the Brit beauty Gemma Arterton announced that she had been cast in The Keys To The Street - a forthcoming adaptation of a Ruth Rendell mystery that ten years ago had been scripted for the screen by none other than Christopher Nolan. Yup - he of Inception and the Batman franchise fame - though don't get confused, he isn't sacrificing Batman 3 to make this. Truth is, this is probably the first he's heard of his script being turned into a movie since he ditched the project to make Batman Begins in around 2002. You see, just after his debut Indie film Following put him on the studio radar back in 1998 - Nolan took the 'work for hire' gig of adapting this mediocre novel just to pay the bills whilst he was working on Memento, and later Insomnia. The novel revolves around a bone marrow donor who starts sleeping with a man whose life she has saved, and who may not altogether be who he seems.... fairly routine thriller stuff. When Fox Searchlight weren't all too pleased with the draft, and Nolan (who barely had any passion in the job from the get-go) moved on to other things - the script was placed on the unproduced shelf, we thought indefinitely. But do things ever stay dead forever in Hollywood? Not when there are marketable, they certainly don't. As the details of this have yet to hit the trades, we are yet to know what studio is involved (whether it's still Fox Searchlight for example) but it doesn't take a genius to work out that it'll be a rival studio to Warner Bros looking to capitalise on the obvious brand power the Brit director holds right now. And unless the property attracts an above average helmer - you can almost guarantee Chris Nolan's name will be marketed all over this. As Fox Searchlight's adaptation has been long dead (and obviously Nolan won't be directing), the script has been readily available for years online, though only in a revised form by DTV horror writer Michael Stokes. Indeed, Carson Reeves at Script Shadow gave it a read last year and declared 'FUCK THIS SCRIPT' in a impassioned negative review;

I think the biggest problem with The Keys To The Street goes back to one of the first things you learn in screenwriting class. Give us a main character we want to root for. I never liked Mary. I didn't know her. I thought she was weak. I thought she was stupid. I thought she was spineless. I could care less if she was taken advantage of because I thought she deserved it. I wanted people to fuck her over. If that's how I feel about your main character, you could write Citizen Fucking Kane and it wouldn't matter.

Expect more details in the trades soon - though we pretty much know this won't be filmed in Q1 of 2011 as Arterton will be shooting the Clash of the Titans sequel. Before or after is a possibility but who knows how far this project is in development right now?