The ’80s renaissance will continue, whether you like it or not. Stranger Things brought the theme song from the 1984 film The Neverending Story back into public consciousness, but See-Saw Films and Michael Ende Productions are planning to show them up with a new live-action film series of Ende’s utterly original, weird, and beautiful book.
As Variety notes, this isn’t See-Saw’s first adaptation rodeo; they are also behind the series Slow Horses and Jane Campion’s The Power of the Dog. Michael Ende Productions has the author’s name, but not his presence; Ende died in 1995. Rights were granted by his executor, Dr. Wolf-Dieter von Granau, and the company’s team includes Roman Hocke, who was Ende’s editor.
While the announcement mentions multiple films, it does not ever actually come out and say whether this new adaptation will cover all of Ende’s book. As any obsessed child who loved the movie and therefore had to read the book knows, the previous film is only half the story. After Bastian gives the Childlike Empress her new name, he is given an opportunity to create everything he could ever wish for—which goes both beautifully and terribly. The second half of the book feels like a very strange and unnerving dream—one that’s concerned with the self, wish fulfillment, storytelling, and imagination. It is not easy adaptation material, but it’s necessary if you really want to tell Ende’s whole story.
Variety writes, “The next task for the newly-formed partnership of See-Saw and Michael Ende Productions will be to find the right creative team to bring the novel to life before packaging the project and seeking out distribution partners.” It will be very interesting to see who signs on to this potentially massive project—and whether we all wind up collectively sobbing about Artax again or not. In the meantime, the earlier adaptation is still there for you, incomplete though it is.
