Laika Recruits Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck for Live-Action Space Romance ‘Atmosphere’

Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, the filmmakers behind “Captain Marvel” and, more recently, “Freaky Tales,” have been tapped by Laika, the Portland, Oregon-based stop-motion animation studio, to write and direct a new live-action project.

The filmmakers will write and direct “Atmosphere,” based on the forthcoming novel by bestselling author Taylor Jenkins Reid, whose “Daisy Jones & The Six” served as inspiration for the Prime Video series of the same name. The announcement was made by Laika’s president of Live Action Film & Series Matt Levin.

According to the official release, “Atmosphere” is “a sweeping romance between two pioneering female astronauts breaking into NASA in the early days of the shuttle program in the late ’70s/early ’80s,” inspired by films like “Apollo 13,” “The Right Stuff” and “Gravity.”

“Atmosphere” is a Laika production in association with Circle M+P. Producers are Travis Knight, Matt Levin, Boden, Fleck, Reid and Brad Mendelsohn. Jeremy Kipp Walker is executive producer.

“We couldn’t be more excited to team up with three boundary-pushing creative voices on this very special film. From books like ‘The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo’ to ‘Carrie Soto Is Back,’ Taylor Jenkins Reid always captivates us with rich, emotionally complex characters and she is in peak form with ‘Atmosphere,’” Levin said in a Thursday statement. “There are no better filmmakers to adapt Taylor’s story for the screen than Ryan and Anna, who throughout their amazing careers have crafted deeply human stories set against canvases of stunning cinematic spectacle. We can’t wait to see them bring Taylor’s world of ‘Atmosphere’ to life.”

Boden and Fleck have made a half-dozen movies, starting off with small-scale character dramas like “Half Nelson” and “Sugar,” before expanding with “Captain Marvel,” a full-on Marvel Studios blockbuster that grossed over $1 billion. Afterwards, they returned to their indie roots with “Freaky Tales,” which premiered at last year’s Sundance Film Festival and was released theatrically by Lionsgate earlier this year. That film, an anthology made up of stories set in Oakland in the late 1980s, winningly combined their arthouse sensibilities with the craft and skill they honed on “Captain Marvel.” The result was one of their very best films.

Laika is the stop-motion animation studio founded in 2005 by president and CEO Knight. They have made five features, including “Coraline,” “ParaNorman” and “Kubo and the Two Strings.” Upcoming projects include “Wildwood,” “The Night Gardener” (described as a more mature feature) and “Piranesi,” based on the novel by Susanna Clarke. On the live-action side, there is a feature based on the novel “Seventeen” by screenwriter John Brownlow, an original feature from Oscar-nominated screenwriter Jon Spaihts and “Crumble” to be written and directed by Brian Duffield and produced by Phil Lord and Chris Miller.

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