Sony is moving forward with their live action Barbie film, and they've just hired a new screenwriter to do a rewrite of the project.
According to Deadline, Diablo Cody has been hired to write the next draft of Barbie. This will be a rewrite of the first draft written by Jenny Bicks (What a Girl Wants, Sex and the City).
Cody has written and directed a number of movies featuring strong female characters including her breakout film Juno as well as Jennifer's Body and Young Adult. All of her movies feature pretty well written characters for women, especially Charlize Theron's character in Young Adult.
Producer Walter Parkes said Cody was being brought on because her unconventionality is just what the project needs, and because they're going for a contemporary tone with the new movie.
Barbie will be a live action film based on the Mattel doll. It's said to be a comedy in the same vein of The Lego Movie. If done right, the movie could actually be pretty clever and a good celebration of female empowerment, much like The Lego Movie was a celebration of creativity and creation. Plus, Barbie is enough of a blank slate that Cody and the other screenwriters can basically do whatever they want with it without having to follow any sort of set canon.
According to Slashfilm, the new movie will depict Barbie as a sort of “modern-day Mary Poppins” who goes around doing various different jobs to help various people. That makes sense considering how ever changing and adaptable Barbie is, and it's a clear sign of Mattel hoping to extend this into a franchise like The Lego Movie did.
The movie's cast has yet to be announced but will apparently consist mostly of newcomers in the role of Barbie, Ken and Barbie's best friend. The rest of the cast will be made up of more well known actors.
Barbie will be the first of two movies Sony is making with Mattel, the other being Masters Of The Universe. Between this and the upcoming Lego movie franchise, movies based on toys might be the next big thing in Hollywood.