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Another British spy character?
That would be rather redundant, one would think -- bringing coals to Newcastle, as it were.
"You're quite right," says kids author Anthony Horowitz, he of the hugely popular Alex Rider books about a teenaged MI6 agent.
"Bond and (real-life double agent Anthony) Blunt, Harry Palmer (of The Ipcress File and other books by Len Deighton), Le Carre..."
But Horowitz did manage to put a new spin on a national obsession. His novels, about a 14-year-old who becomes heir to the family trade after his uncle is killed on a mission, have sold millions -- nine million alone of the first one, Stormbreaker.
Now Alex Rider: Stormbreaker is a $40-million movie, which opens in threatres on Friday. It stars the likes of Ewan McGregor, Robbie Coltrane, Andy Sirkis, Alicia Silverstone, Mickey Rourke, Stephen Fry and newcomer Alex Pettyfer as Alex Rider.
Of course, the movie is working a street well-travelled by the Spy Kids and Agent Cody Banks series.
"Cody Banks came out dauntingly in the middle of the Alex Rider series, by book 3," says Horowitz, who scripted and exec-produced the movie, which debuted last month at the Toronto film festival. "But I think (Cody and Spy Kids) are different from Alex Rider. Spy Kids played much younger, and Cody Banks was more of a comedy than a drama, spying being a bit of a giggle."
Alex Rider is a bit of a surly teen and reluctant spy, who is manipulated by MI6 (Britain's international spy agency) and sorely out of the loop on things that affect him. Horowitz created him as a spy for cynical times.
"Alex came from Harry Palmer more than from Bond," he says. "He belongs to a world in which we don't trust intelligence sources, in which kids wouldn't think of being a patriot, and in which spies themselves are manipulated and lied to."
"The truth is, though Britain has a long tradition of secret agencies and spies, I don't think spies are quite the heroes they were, not off-celluloid anyway. Kids are living in the world as it is now."
With all those book sales, Stormbreaker the movie was something of a slam-dunk. There's the requisite backstory, in which Alex's uncle Ian (MacGregor) goes missing and is presumed dead. Alex, who'd been led to believe his uncle was a banker, must absorb the truth, deal with being inducted into MI6, undergo training, hold his own alongside beefy career soldiers and finally go undercover to thwart an insane industrialist (Rourke) whose scheme involves the introduction to market of personal supercomputers called Stormbreakers.
"It was an amazing cast, and I was actually very surprised how it fell together," Horowitz says. "Producers, when they're making a film, dangle names in front of you. And they say, 'Maybe we can get Ewan MacGregor.' And of course they're talking through their backsides. But in this case, I don't think there was a single person they mentioned that they didn't get. Which was incredible, really.
"Of course Mickey Rourke was a great catch, but we got Andy Sirkis (aka Gollum and bodydouble for King Kong) for God's sake as (evil henchman) Mr. Grimm. He doesn't even speak, but of course he's one of the greatest body actors on the planet."
On the eve of its North American release, the pieces are in place for an Alex Rider movie series of Harry Potter length. All that's missing is the audience.
"To be honest, there won't be a sequel unless there's a certain level of success. And how it does in England is almost irrelevant to how it does in America and Canada.
"The screenplay for (the sequel) Point Blanc is written, so everything is in play. There's six books, a seventh on its way. So the dream is a seven-movie series."
jim.slotek@tor.sunpub.com