Robert Downey Jr to headline Vertigo remake from Paramount Pictures: report

Vertigo, the classic Alfred Hitchcock 1958 psychological thriller, is reportedly getting a remake. According to Deadline, Paramount Pictures has acquired the remake rights of the film with Robert Downey Jr.Amount, the Avengers) set to headline the cast lineup. In it, he will reprise late actor James Stewart’s role from the original film – a retired detective suffering from acrophobia aka the fear of heights. Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight is attached to pen the Vertigo remake, which is produced by Davis Entertainment in association with Susan Downey and Robert’s own company, Team Downey.

Downey has laid down as an actor since 2019’s Avengers: Endgame, which became the second highest-grossing film of all time upon its re-release. He then moved to executive production and star dolittle, which was considered a box office bomb, was followed by an appearance in ‘Senior’, a Netflix documentary that examined his father’s career and relationships. Downey will next be seen in a Christopher Nolan film oppenheimer Lewis Strauss, as chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission. Next in the works is the Park Chan-wook-directed The Sympathizer TV series for HBO and A24, with Downey attached to star and executive produce.

Directed by Hitchcock, Vertigo follows John “Scotty” Ferguson (Stewart), a former San Francisco police detective who retires from the force due to a paralyzing fear of heights exacerbated by vertigo. When Bloodhound is hired by an acquaintance to shadow his wife (KIM Novak) and uncover her strange behavior, Scotty finds himself obsessed with her. However, his acrophobia renders him powerless when one day, he fails to save the woman from her death. Based on the 1954 French novel D’entre les morts, Hitchcock’s adaptation went on to inspire the 1965 Tamil film Kalangarai Vilakkam and much later Brian De Palma’s Passion. While Vertigo received mixed reviews upon initial release, it soon gained a cult following, placing in the top 10 in a 1982 survey conducted by the British Film Institute’s Sight & Sound publication. It is now widely regarded as one of the greatest films ever made.

Some other Hitchcock films have been remade before, ranging from Gus Van Sant’s shot-by-shot reinterpretation of Psycho to A Perfect Murder, starring Michael Douglas, based on 1954’s Dial M for Murder. . However, this will be the first time we get a complete remake from an American studio. Earlier this week, Vertigo remake writer Knight was brought onboard to write the untitled Star Wars film, which Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy (Ms. Marvel) is attached to direct. Original screenwriters Damon Lindelof (Lost) and Justin Britt-Gibson (Counterpart) have officially departed the project.