THE PROPERTY/DEVELOPER

The costumes from Justin Chadwick’s first feature, The Other Boleyn Girl, are still wowing audiences but the director is already looking at some very different material for a second outing.

This one is called The Property, a risky topic in Britain at the moment, and sure enough this story is a thriller.

Set in contemporary London, The Property tells of a young professional couple who acquire their dream home by underhanded means, only for the previous owner to return, looking for revenge.

Silly couple, they should have known that sleight of hand does not work in London – unless you happen to be an estate agent.

The film is based on an original script by Clive Dawson, who served up an equally bluntly titled film, The Bunker, with Jason Flemyng in 2001.

The Property's producer, Robert Jones, says, We’ve been searching for a London-based thriller for some time. The Property’ has intriguing, morally ambiguous characters and is a gripping story about the lengths supposedly decent people will go to get what they want, and how their decency disintegrates when the consequences are far worse than they could ever imagine."

Jones was behind the much more amusing Run, Fat Boy, Run which only opens in the US this month.

Now for the real mystery: Will the film actually ever get made? On papere it sounds like a good thing but Jones’s company, Material, is backed by US money which has just changed owners and only time will tell.

Filed March 13, 2008.