Over the past year or two we’ve been hearing about some tantalizing possibilities for director Paul Verhoeven’s next project. Among them, a potentially controversial film about the life of Jesus (based on Verhoeven’s own book Jesus of Nazareth), an edgy thriller called The Surrogate starring Halle Berry, and a rumoured adaptation of the Indiana Jones-esque video game The Last Express. It’s been about 10 years now since he’s done any full-on genre stuff, and in the last decade his only other film has been the Dutch WWII thriller Black Book. Alas, if you were hoping for a return to films like Robocop, Starship Troopers or even Showgirls, you’re likely to be disappointed with this announcement. It looks like his next movie will be an adaptation of a Dutch novel by Louis Couperus called The Hidden Force.

Variety reports that the story takes place in 1900 on the island of Java in the Dutch East Indies. A colonial official named Van Oudyck finds himself at odds with the mystical culture of the East Indians, and increasingly plagued by supernatural happenings. For this project, Verhoeven will reteam with Black Book co-writer Gerard Soeteman and producer San Fu Maltha.

I guess we’ll just have to wait a little longer for Verhoeven’s return to Hollywood, although at this point I’m wondering if that return will ever actually happen. In previous interviews about The Surrogate, he has talked about how hard it is to get funding for something that he considers to be “provocative and sexual.” There certainly aren’t many studios out there taking risks right now. What do you think, is Verhoeven doing the right thing by staying outside the Hollywood system?

Around the Web: