Shyamalan to film Life of Pi

<div class="section1"><div align="left" style="position:relative; left: -2"><table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" align="left" border="1" width="77.5%"> <colgroup> <col width="100.0%" /> </colgroup> <tr valign="top"> <td width="100.0%" colspan="1" rowspan="1" style="" valign:="" top="" background-color:="" f3f3f3=""> <div class="Normal"><script language="javascript" src="Config?Configid=43376741"></script><br /><a href="javascript:popUp(&quot1;photopop?msid=224275&type=0&quot1;)"> <img border="0" align="left" src="/cms.dll/thumb?height=338&width=338&photoID=224275" hspace="12"" /></a></div> </td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td width="100.0%" colspan="1" rowspan="1" style="" valign:="" top="" background-color:="" f3f3f3=""> <div class="Normal"><span style="" font-size:="">Click to enlarge</span></div> </td> </tr> </table></div> <div class="Normal">M.Night Shyamalan may return to his hometown of Pondicherry to film scenes for his upcoming project, <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Life of Pi. </span><br /><br />The film, based on the Man Booker Prize-winning novel by Yann Martel, is being produced by Fox. This will be Shyamalan''s first project for the Fox studio, after a phenomenal run of success for rival Disney with his hit films <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">The Sixth Sense, Signs</span> and <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Unbreakable</span>, which have grossed an estimated $1.3 billion for Disney.<br /><br />Shyamalan is expected to write the screenplay himself, as he has with each of his previous films.<br /><br />Fox president Elizabeth Gabler told the <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Hollywood Reporter</span> that Shyamalan was the natural choice to direct <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Life of Pi</span>, which is a fantastical tale about Piscine Molitor (Pi) Patel, a young Pondicherry man who finds himself stranded in the middle of the Pacific Ocean in a small boat, accompanied by a zebra, an orangutan, a hyena and a Bengal tiger. <br /><br />"The material is very challenging and Night is a filmmaker who is always looking for new challenges," Gabler told the trade journal. <br /><br />"There are also some similarities to Pi Patel and Night. Pi is an immigrant child who left his homeland and found his way to a new country, and Night was also a boy who left India and found his way to this country. He saw it as a way to explore a completely new challenging realm."<br /><br />It is not certain when Shyamalan will shoot <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Life of Pi.</span> The director is currently in Philadelphia at work on <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">The Village</span> (formerly The Woods), with actors Joaquin Phoenix, Bryce Howard, Sigourney Weaver, Adrien Brody and William Hurt (I-W, Oct. 10).</div> </div>