Variety reports that actress Amanda Seyfried (Jennifer’s Body) will be starring in I’m.mortal, the new sci-fi film from writer/director Andrew Niccol, most famous for his cult-favored sci-fi/dramas Gattaca and The Truman Show.
We reported on I’m.mortal back in the spring and if you’re wondering what a sci-fi movie with such an odd title could possibly be about, here’s the official synopsis to help you along:
In the future, time has become the currency. Once you turn 25 and your aging gene turns off, you must buy and bank time. If you are rich enough, you can live forever. But if you run out of time, you are engineered to die automatically.When a rebel from the ghetto is falsely accused of murdering a wealthy man for his time, he is forced to go on the run with a beautiful, rich hostage (Seyfried). Together, this duo rages against the system, living minute to minute. They discover that love is more powerful than all the time in the world.
Seyfried has become something of a true chameleon actress – she started on soap operas (All My Children, As The World Turns); had breakout roles as a promiscuous cousin-kissing airhead in Mean Girls and the reluctant member of a polygamous family in Big Love; went on to strike box office gold alongside Meryl Streep in the movie musical Mama Mia!; tackled the teen drama and horror genres all at once in Jennifer’s Body; and has, as of late, settled into mentally fiscally stimulating romantic leading roles in films like Dear John and Letters to Juliet. Sci-fi/action is really just the next logical sampling in the Amanda Seyfried acting buffet.
The male lead role in I’m.mortal has yet to be cast, but at this point I have to hope the leading man is someone with the chops to keep up with Seyfried (read: not Channing Tatum). After seeing the young actress already play a vapid and shallow character in Mean Girls and heavier thoughtful characters in projects like Big Love, I’m interested to see how she combines such wide range in order to portray a young woman who starts out taking life and mortality for granted, but who ends up valuing life and love as the preciously fragile things they are.
No matter how much Niccol dresses up his stories in wonderfully inventive sci-fi disguises, he never fails to tell a very human story about very human sentiments and emotions. Seems he has that goal still in mind, judging from the young talent being tapped for this film. Consider me excited.
I’m.mortal should start shooting soon and is currently slated for release sometime in 2011.
