Released in 1906, Upton Sinclair‘s The Jungle has become one of the most important whistleblower books in American literature history; telling the story of Lithuanian immigrant Jurgis and his struggles to make it in America, it went into detail about the terrible conditions in Chicago’s meat packing district from the way they handled the meat itself (very unsanitary to say the least, and stop snickering) to their wretched treatment of their workers many of whom didn’t speak English which made it easy to take advantage of them. Thanks to The Jungle, the country began to pay more attention to food safety and led to the creation of the Food and Drug Administration in 1930. And this is despite the fact that Sinclair intended the book to bring the plight of immigrant workers and their exploitation into the public light.
And now, The Jungle is becoming a movie to be directed by that guy from Friends? During a chat with Empire (via The Playlist), David Schwimmer announced his plans to move into more epic (but still character-driven) fare with his directorial career and had commissioned an adaptation of the Sinclair novel. A novel this deep and heartbreaking is going to take some care in order to be successful. Besides having it set in the early 1900’s, all the themes about exploitation and America not being the beacon of hope immigrants thought it would be will have to stay intact, which seems difficult in a movie industry that’s too afraid to challenge its movie going audience nowadays. After Schwimmer’s Trust and Run Fatboy Run, one has to admire his moxie and ambitions to adapt The Jungle; let’s just see if it actually gets off the ground. This has all the trappings of “development hell.” But then again, Sinclair’s other novel Oil! was used to fashion the Paul Thomas Anderson film There Will Be Blood, so maybe that will be the arguing point that gets this actually made.
What do you think about Schwimmer heading into The Jungle?