JIMI HENDRIX movie in the works... again
Legendary Pictures producer Thomas Tull has got guitar on the brain. His documentary It Might Get Loud which starred Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page, U2's the Edge and Jack White of the White Stripes was recently released. And now he has his eyes set on another guitar God, the one and only Jimi Hendrix.
Tull, who also produced Dark Knight, would produce the pic with Bill Gerber(Gran Torino). Max Borenstein(What Is Life Worth?) is writing the script.
Variety reports:
Legendary hopes to crack the rights issues that have prevented previous Hendrix projects from getting out of the gate. The company's plan is to develop the project first, then try to win the cooperation of the estate.
There have been numerous attempts to develop a Hendrix film in recent years, with such musician-actors as Lenny Kravitz and Outkast's Andre Benjamin floated as possible stars. But no one has locked down rights with Experience Hendrix, the gatekeeper to the musician's estate, which is run by his stepsister, Janie Hendrix.
The studio has been in loose discussions with the estate, but no firm rights deal has been made as of yet, which would be needed to access Hendrix's singular sound and guitar wizardry.
This sounds like the most promising Hendrix project to surface so far. They must have faith that they can acquire the rights. I doubt Legendary would be investing money into something they didn't think they could get otherwise.
I think a more difficult task is casting Jimi Hendrix himself. Kravitz isn't a bad choice, but he doesn't really look all that much like Hendrix. And at 45 it'd be hard to depict a young Hendrix who died at 27! Benjamin who's 34, looks a lot more like Hendrix.
Another obvious hurdle... Who can play guitar like arguably the greatest guitar player to ever live??? And let's keep in mind Hendrix was a lefty! They'd have to flip images or something. Movie magic aside, you can tell when someone's fakin' the funk on guitar.
So what do you think? Are you ready to experience Jimi Hendrix on the big screen?