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Universal, Verbinski redo 'Host'

Bond to direct, Poirier to write film

By MICHAEL FLEMING

Bong Joon-ho-directed thriller 'The Host' did record biz in its 2006 theatrical run in South Korea.

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Universal Pictures and Gore Verbinski will remake the 2006 Bong Joon-ho-directed Korean thriller "The Host," with commercials director Fredrik Bond making his feature helming debut and Mark Poirier ("Smart People") to pen the script.

Story follows a town terrorized by a giant mutant squidlike creature hatched by toxins that flow into a nearby river from a military base. When the creature grabs a little girl, her dysfunctional family must band together to rescue her.

Verbinski will produce with Vertigo's Roy Lee and Doug Davison, along with Paul Brooks.

The film, originally titled "Gwoemul," did record-breaking business in its theatrical run in South Korea.

Bond has directed campaigns for Nike, Adidas and Levi's. He and Verbinski had been looking for a project to do together, and Bond said he embraced the opportunity to mix a larger-than-life monster with a heartfelt family drama.

"It processes a few genres together, and visually it feels close to the stuff I've made over the last few years in commercials, the tonality of humor and the scale," Bond said.

Verbinski set up the project through Blind Wink Prods., the company he formed at Universal, where he is developing to direct an adaptation of the vidgame "Bioshock."