Odds are you didn't catch Timecrimes when it had its tiny debut last fall. The Spanish time-travel thriller was one of the twistiest, most entertaining sci-fi movies I saw all of last year, and deserved a much wider audience than it got. At least the movie's director, Nacho Vigalondo, will be given a bigger shot. He's been picked to direct Gangland for Mandate Pictures and Steven Zaillian, an action comedy based on Vigalondo's idea which will be put into a screenplay by Pat Healy.
The story, as described in THR, sounds kind of like Tron for the Grand Theft Auto generation. A team of cocky video-game developers find themselves trapped in a real-life version of the game they promised to deliver. Rather than riding around on lightcycles, they apparently have to escape the gangsters in the underworld they created.
A final little detail in the story is that Timecrimes will be getting an English-language remake, headed by Zaillian. As much as I'm afraid they won't catch the subtle weirdness of the original film, I'm glad to see any original time-travel story make it to a wider audience, and really looking forward to what Vigalondo does next.
