If you’ve yet to check out Norwegian director Morten Tyldum’s 2011 release, Headhunters, then it’s high time you tracked it down and finally gave it a go. Not only is it one of the most brutal, gross, unique, and exciting action thrillers that have come out in a long time, but you’re also going to need to know what Tyldum is capable of in order to properly get excited for the news that he’s just signed on to make another movie.
Deadline reports that his new project is called The Imitation Game, and it’s coming from a Black List script by Graham Moore that was adapted from an Alan Turing biography that Andrew Hodges wrote called “Alan Turing: The Enigma.” The film was originally set to be made by Warner Bros., with J Blakeson on to direct and rumors that Leonardo DiCaprio would star, but the studio dropped the project back in August.
For those that might not know, Turing was a pretty interesting guy whose rich life could make for good movie fodder in a number of ways. Just take a look at the source material’s Amazon description, which states:
“Hodges tells how Turing’s revolutionary idea of 1936–the concept of a universal machine–laid the foundation for the modern computer and how Turing brought the idea to practical realization in 1945 with his electronic design. The book also tells how this work was directly related to Turing’s leading role in breaking the German Enigma ciphers during World War II, a scientific triumph that was critical to Allied victory in the Atlantic. At the same time, this is the tragic story of a man who, despite his wartime service, was eventually arrested, stripped of his security clearance, and forced to undergo a humiliating treatment program–all for trying to live honestly in a society that defined homosexuality as a crime.”
Battling the Nazis, inventing the computer, and dealing with being homosexual in an intolerant age? The head spins with how much Tyldum could do with this material. Factor in that Turing tragically took his own life at the age of 41, and it becomes pretty clear that this is a story that as wide an audience as possible needs to hear. Fortunate, then, that people as talented as Moore and Tyldum are going to be bringing it to movie theaters.