MGM Plans To Bring ‘THE SHRINKING MAN’ To The Big Screen

If you listen to the official Destroy the Brain podcast – which you SHOULD! – you may remember that a few weeks ago (on the episode found HERE) I caught the original 1957 Universal film The Incredible Shrinking Man while flipping through the TV.  It had been years since I had seen the film but was something that always stuck with me over the years as the idea was quite frightening to me as a little kid.  Richard Matheson wrote the original book The Shrinking Man which the film was based on.  A film sequel was written by the author as well but was never made by Universal.  They did however go for a more comedic remake of sorts in 1981 with The Incredible Shrinking Woman directed by Joel Schumacher (The Lost Boys).  Now, it seems, MGM is interested in the property as they have just acquired the rights to Richard Matheson’s novel.  It’s being reported by The Hollywood Reporter that:

Matheson, who turns 87 later this month, will pen the screenplay with his son, Richard Matheson Jr., keeping the tone of the original story but updating it to modern times.

The article on THR goes on to relay some info on the updated project from the acclaimed author himself.

Describing the new iteration as “an existential action movie,” the elder Matheson says, “My original story was a metaphor for how man’s place in the world was diminishing. That still holds today, where all these advancements that are going to save us will be our undoing.”

No word has been released when we might see this small story hit the big screen.  Compared to some of the larger “Universal Monsters” titles that featured mummies, vampires, and werewolves, 1957’s The Incredible Shrinking Man always seemed to be treated as a second-tier film.  Hopefully with the upcoming remake, maybe some will rediscover the original and see that it stands just as tall as the Frankenstein monster.