Dream a Little Dream: Joseph Gordon-Levitt and The Sandman film
A tweet that launched a gush of fan love (and, corresponding fan hate) happened last night:
Ladies and gentlemen, I’m incredibly honored to be working with David Goyer, Warner Bros, and @neilhimself on SANDMAN. #Prelude
— Joseph Gordon-Levitt (@hitRECordJoe) December 17, 2013
And that folks, is word from the horse’s mouth.
For years rumours of a Sandman movie, based on DC’s imprint Vertigo series, percolated. The Sandman series ran for 75 issues from 1988-1996 and was penned by Neil Gaiman. It’s eponymous protagonist went by many names: The Sandman, Morpheus, or Dream and was portrayed in goth style. The series allowed Gaiman to blend mythologies and folk tales in a variety of genres that he’d later revisit in his award winning novels. The art style reflected the fluidity of the themes, with many different artists working on it over the series. Not surprisingly, these tales attracted a far different audience than the mainstream super-hero titles. It’s been so successful that the entire series has been re-issued in both trades and as DC Absolute hardcover volumes. The uniqueness that drew the audience to The Sandman is also the key challenge for both writing and art design for a motion picture.
Dream aka Morpheus aka The Sandman by Kelley Jones and Malcolm Jones III
However, it looks like Gordon-Levitt is willing to take up the challenge. He will be working with David Goyer, who wrote the script for The Dark Knight and, reassuring to fans of the comic, Neil Gaiman himself. Gordon-Levitt has garnered some renown with his directorial debut “Don Jon“, an independent film that he also wrote and starred in. This success is causing rumours of him as the potential director on the project, but nothing has been announced at this time.
The other hashtag from the tweet (#Prelude) is a hint that the material will come from the first eight issue arc, gathered in Preludes and Nocturnes. It’s an interesting choice because it starts with the Sandman’s imprisonment and subsequent revenge. The issues ricocheted between styles and wandered through the DC universe involving such characters as John Constantine, Doctor Destiny (John Dee), and the Justice League International’s Martian Manhunter. Other arcs in the series are much more self-contained, and I would have expected them to be a more logical jumping off point.
So will Gordon-Levitt be leaping from roles like Looper’s Joe or The Dark Knight Rises Blake to the Endless Morpheus, or will he be taking on another character or position in this film/franchise? With no timeline set, it just means lots of time for fans to speculate.
