'99 Homes' Director Ramin Bahrani To Helm 'Fahrenheit 451' For HBO

Ray Bradbury‘s classic "Fahrenheit 451" was both perfectly of its time and chillingly ahead of its time. While books aren’t literally being burned in the street, it speaks to the culture at the moment that we have an annual Banned Books Week. And with knowledge increasingly politicized (see the ongoing battle of evolution vs. creationism in classrooms), Bradbury’s book still resonates, and now it’s getting ready for a brand new cinematic treatment.

HBO has tapped Ramin Bahrani ("99 Homes," "At Any Price") to write and direct a new adaptation of the novel. Francois Truffaut previously brought his vision of Bradbury’s work to cinemas in 1966, telling the story of Guy Montag, a fireman tasked with burning contraband material, who suddenly has a crisis of conscience. Here’s the book synopsis:

Guy Montag is a fireman. In his world, where television rules and literature is on the brink of extinction, firemen start fires rather than put them out. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they are hidden.

Montag never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life and wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her television “family.” But then he meets an eccentric young neighbor, Clarisse, who introduces him to a past where people didn’t live in fear and to a present where one sees the world through the ideas in books instead of the mindless chatter of television.

When Mildred attempts suicide and Clarisse suddenly disappears, Montag begins to question everything he has ever known. He starts hiding books in his home, and when his pilfering is discovered, the fireman has to run for his life.

No word if this is Bahrani’s next project, but he doesn’t seem to have anything else cooking at the moment. But as a filmmaker with a perceptive eye for human behavior, his take on this material should be fascinating. [The Wrap]