In the future, all content will be on Netflix. It seems like there’s nothing their money can’t buy, not a resurrection of cinema history’s most fabled lost film and not a long-forbidden adaptation of a literary masterwork.
The Hollywood Reporter announced this morning that the latest feather in the streaming giant’s cap would be a miniseries take on Gabriel García Márquez’s landmark novel ‘One Hundred Years of Solitude’.
It will be the first filmed version of Marquez’s novel, which he had guarded from producers in Hollywood and Spain alike until his death in 2014. Marquez’s living sons, Rodrigo García and Gonzalo García Barcho, felt secure in going against these wishes.
The THR story includes a quote from the sons: “For decades our father was reluctant to sell the film rights to ‘Cien Anos de Soledad’ because he believed that it could not be made under the time constraints of a feature film, or that producing it in a language other than Spanish would not do it justice.”
Netflix has assuaged these concerns by expanding the run time to series length – though whether the project will be ongoing or a miniseries has not been established, perhaps to leave open the option for more in case of success – and retaining its original language.
‘One Hundred Years of Solitude’ recounts the history of the Buendia family across seven generations, weaving an epic narrative tapestry from the founding of their fictitious Colombian hometown to the present. Its flights of magical-realist fancy and heartrending melodrama still captivate literature students today.
The series continues Netflix’s efforts to get a stronger foothold in Spain’s entertainment economy, which have come to a head with their planned opening of a new local production hub in the country. If any of the creative personnel describes the project as “more of a hundred-hour movie,” however, may God help them.
Published 6 Mar 2019
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