Roman Coppola Still Open To Making DOCTOR STRANGE, Neil Gaiman And Benedict Cumberbatch Need To Be Involved

Roman Coppola revealed a couple of weeks ago that he was once attached to make a live-action Doctor Strange film back in the days of Roger Corman's Fantastic Four. His vision never did make it to cameras and the company eventually created Marvel Studios to control quality. Roman has become a very accomplished screenwriter earning an Oscar nomination this year for co-writing Moonrise Kingdom with Wes Anderson. He previously worked as second unit director on films such as Dracula (cutting his teeth in the horror genre) and Lost In Translation. While promoting his new film Charlie Swan (which he directed) he commented if on he'd still be interested in making Strange to FlickeringMyth (via CBM). Marvel recently announced that the occult superhero would apart of their Phase Three lineup.

“Nowadays it’s over saturated with so many comic book movies. It has lessened in my mind. In the past, 15 to 20 years ago, when I talked about Doctor Strange most of the comic book movies were terrible. They’ve [I’m speaking of the Marvel Universe] managed to make them more true to the spirit of the comics as I recall reading them as a boy. If someone said to me, ‘We’d love you to do Doctor Strange. Run with it. What’s your take on it?’ I’d be delighted to have a shot at that but it seems that many comic book movies are made with a certain mentality that pervades all of them. If I had my choice I’d rather do an individualistic than a factory movie but you never know. I’m open to whatever adventure comes my way.” 

I'd love to see Coppola direct theres another name I'm dying to see get involved. That is legendary comic book writer/novelist Neil Gaiman. He's been invovled with the development of the Strange film back when Guillermo del Toro was attached to direct. Neil was tasked to come up with a script which ultimately also fell-threw. He's obsessed with Steve Ditko (who created Strange)  participating in Jonathan Ross' Searching For Steve Ditko documentary. Gaiman has enough geek credibility like Whedon to bring a faithful but cinematic take on the Sorcerer Supreme. His novel Stardust was adapted into a film by Matthew Vaughn. Gaiman wrote screenplays for Beowulf and Coraline along with two episodes of Doctor Who. Having Gaiman do re-writes on the existing script written by Joshua Oppenheimer and Thomas Donnelly or at least consulting is a must.

There has been rally to get Benedict Cumberbatch cast in the lead role. It's not hard to see why he would be perfect for the role with his series Sherlock amassing such a loyal international following. Not to mention film credits that include in Star Trek Into Darkness, War Horse, Atonement, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, and Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug/There And Back.