A live-action series adaptation of Italian comic creator Hugo Pratt’s Corto Maltese is setting sail with Studiocanal and Frank Miller. The Sin City writer and artist, who co-directed the 2005 film adaptation of his Dark Horse graphic novel with Robert Rodriguez, will serve as creator, writer, and executive producer of the six-episode Corto Maltese series in partnership with France’s Canal+ channel. (A live-action film about the seafaring adventurer was announced in 2018 with Tom Hughes and Mila Jovovich set to star in the swashbuckler flick from TriPictures, but that project was scrapped.) Deadline first reported the news.
I wish to play up the romance, the heroism and the underlying mysticism of Pratt’s creation. This is a rascal who could talk to the gods. Corto is not the weathered pirate he is to become when we meet him. He is the young adventurer out to discover the world and making a lot of money doing it. But just like Odysseus, he has no idea what a wild world he is to discover. It is a world full of magic and horrors.
For the pilot, I wish to establish a grand hero in a grand and terrible world but above all, it is an adventure story starring an adventure hero. While we will learn a lot about his character, we will learn it on the run. We will start the series with the first image staring Corto square in the face. While the camera and the action will move all over the place, the story will always stare Corto straight in the face. To quote Raymond Chandler, ‘He is the hero, he is everything.’
