Matt Reeves To Write/Direct A Film Based On The Short Story ’8 O’Clock in the Morning’

Those consistent scoopmeisters over at Deadline reveal that Matt Reeves, the director of Cloverfield and Let Me In, will next write and direct a film for Universal Pictures based on the Ray Nelson short story 8 O’Clock in the Morning, which was also the basis for the cult classic 1988 John Carpenter film They Live.

The story follows a man who awakens one morning with the crystal-clear realization that we are surrounded daily by the presence of aliens that are controlling society. It is owned by Universal Pictures due to it being used as the basis for the classic Carpenter sci-fi horror. In that film, aliens were discovered through the use of special glasses. None of that is being used here, and apparently the film is not considered a remake.

Speaking to Deadline about the project Reeves revealed: “I saw an opportunity to do a movie that was very point-of-view driven, a psychological science fiction thriller that explores this guy’s nightmare,” There could be a desperate love story at the center of this. Carpenter took a satirical view of the material and the larger political implication that we’re being controlled. I am very drawn to the emotional side, the nightmare experience with the paranoia of Invasion of the Body Snatchers or a Roman Polanski-style film.”

For those still fiending hoping for a Cloverfield sequel Reeves said “it’s still on the drawing board.” His collaborators for that film have been pretty busy. Drew Goddard directed The Cabin in the Woods (which has been delayed due to MGM’s financial woes) and JJ Abrams has been busy with Super 8 and the upcoming Star Trek sequel. “If we crack a story we all love, we’ll do it,” said Reeves.