Thursday, January 5, 2012

Sabrina Benulis's "Archon"

Sabrina Benulis graduated with a master’s in writing popular fiction from Seton Hill University. She currently resides in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania with her husband, Mike, and her spoiled cockatiel, Caesar.

Here she shares some insights into adapting Archon, her debut novel, for the big screen:
Archon and its sequels in "The Books of Raziel" trilogy would make unbelievable movies. This is a pipe-dream for me, of course. Really, the odds of any novelist's books becoming a movie are quite slim, even if they're optioned, and then by gosh you'd better hope the adaptation is at least a little faithful to your book.

But if all of those magic dominoes happened to fall just right, it would be awesome.

Really, Archon requires a cast mostly of unknowns. Angela Mathers, my protagonist, is tall with a model's striking face, so an edgy actress in her late teens with some sharp acting skills would do well. Kim, my main male character, looks a lot like the magician Criss Angel with longer hair. I don't know if he acts!

Israfel is a strikingly androgynous angel with the beauty of men and women perfectly combined. Recently I saw a picture of the male model Andrej Pejic and was stunned by his resemblance to what I pictured Israfel to look like.

And one of my demons--Python--could be awesomely portrayed by Johnny Depp. You need that kind of quirkiness for his character.

Tim Burton would be great as the director. I say this because "The Books of Raziel" is full of action and heavy on gothic atmosphere, and Burton has proven himself quite well in both areas. However, the story becomes epic and I can't help but also look to Peter Jackson, who did spectacular work with The Lord of the Rings trilogy. If you're going to make a movie about another world, going into detail almost to the point of ridiculousness is the way to do it right.

My book, the movie...

It's an awesome dream.
Learn more about the book and author at Sabrina Benulis's website, blog, and Facebook page.

--Marshal Zeringue