Zack Snyder, known for such films as “300” and “Batman v Superman,” recently announced through the social media site Vero that his next project will be an adaptation of Ayn Rand’s influential novel “The Fountainhead.”
The book, as well as Rand herself, has been a major influence on many right-leaning thinkers.
President Donald Trump is a fan of the book and has said he identifies with the main character of Howard Roark, according to an interview in USA Today. Roark is an ambitious architect fighting against the Establishment powers of both the government and bureaucratic groups that are working to suppress individuality in favor of more popular group standards.
Politicians such as Rand Paul, Ron Paul and Paul Ryan have also praised Ayn Rand and her work. She is considered by many to be one of the biggest influences on the modern libertarian movement.
Snyder previously spoke about his appreciation for “The Fountainhead” in a 2016 interview with The Hollywood Reporter. “I have been working on ‘The Fountainhead.’ I’ve always felt like ‘The Fountainhead’ was such a thesis on the creative process and what it is to create something,” he said. “Warner Bros. owns [Ayn Rand’s] script and I’ve just been working on that a little bit.”
The 1943 novel was previously adapted into a film starring Gary Cooper in 1949. Ayn Rand was credited with writing that script.
What’s so significant about this new deal is the combination of Ayn Rand’s and Zack Snyder’s names. Rand may be one of the biggest-selling and most influential authors of all time, but modern Hollywood has largely ignored her books because of their staunch support for individualism and their intense criticism of a growing government.
Snyder, however, is a big-budget filmmaker with major blockbusters under his belt. If the same attention is paid to “The Fountainhead” as to his other movies (“Man of Steel” among them), it could mean a major turning point for conservative cinema in Hollywood.
Related: Three Great Movie Adaptations of Conservative Novels
Besides the Gary Cooper film, Rand’s only other major film adaptations came with the “Atlas Shrugged” trilogy, which ran from 2011 to 2014. The novel “Atlas Shrugged” had a massive following and was one of the biggest-selling books of all time, but the movies got little support from Hollywood and instead had to be independently produced.
The fact that a major filmmaker (whose films are often praised by conservatives) is spearheading “The Fountainhead” — along with a major studio, Warner Bros. — means creative works with right-leaning messages may be taken a little more seriously inside the film industry.
Now the only real test is to see whether people respond to a Snyder-directed version of “The Fountainhead.” But considering the success of the novel and the success of Snyder, there is a chance this film ends up a game-changer for the landscape of modern Hollywood.
PopZette editor Zachary Leeman can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter.
(photo credit, homepage and article images: Zack Snyder [1], [2], CC BY-SA 2.0, by Gage Skidmore)
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