Columbia Pictures has acquired "Swift," from director Barry Sonnenfeld and Ben David Grabinski, as a potential feature film franchise updating the "Tom Swift" series of adventure novels.
Debuting in 1910, 'the Tom Swift' character is a young inventor in five series of juvenile science fiction/adventure novels, created by Edward Stratemeyer, founder of the Stratemeyer Syndicate book-packaging firm, to "take advantage of the market for children's science adventure".
The books were written by several ghostwriters over the years, published under the collective pseudonym 'Victor Appleton'.
Each series focused on Tom’s inventions, a number of which pre-dated actual inventions, selling over 20 million copies worldwide.
Sonnenfeld and Grabinski's version would feature Swift as one-half of a father-son team who are among the greatest inventors of all time.
Albie "Lemony Snicket" Hecht will produce with Sonnenfeld...
