The Prisoner Returns?

Christopher Nolan, director of such films as Memento and Batman Begins, is reportedly attempting to get the rights to film a big screen adaptation of “The Prisoner”, which was Patrick McGoohan's follow-up to “Secret Agent Man”, a more straightforward spy series. “The Prisoner” was about a spy who resigns his post, only to be kidnapped and subjected to psychological games in an eerie, polychromatic village, never sure if he's being interrogated by the enemy, or his own former employers. It was exceedingly bizarre in points, like when the whole series culminated in a raging gun battle with guys in gorilla suits to the tune of “All You Need is Love”, but to anyone who's actually seen it, it left a lot of iconic images in their heads. It was like the dark and dysfunctional mirror image of In Like Flint, or a 60's beach party movie director made an expose about psychological warfare.

Unfortunately while it certainly holds up after forty years, it is still very much a product of its time. The suave superspy with nary a hair out of place has been done to death by forty years of Bond movies, so while McGoohan used this archetype as the calm center of a world that changed every week with a new opponent and a new game, it cannot be used again. Given the tendency of all these exploitations of old TV properties to solve all their problems with self-aware parodies of their source material, “The Prisoner” is particularly ill-suited to an update... it's too silly to begin with to parody. Mike Meyers made use of some of its icons for Austin Powers (who does #2 work for?) but as part of a larger mix.

Christopher Nolan did rebuild the Batman franchise when it looked desperately played out, and he did it by taking it seriously again, so maybe he can pull it off. However there's another risk to all of this, that having a movie that's like Kafka in primary colors playing in the same multiplex as films like Rendition is going to seem a bit flippant. Done right it could be inspired, but the people who buy old TV properties and dress them up have to hedge their bets by winking at the audience and insecurely sneering at the source material. So I don't have high hopes.