Hit post-apocalyptic novel Pure to get the big-screen treatment from Fox

Last Updated on July 23, 2021

This one we’ll have to keep an eye on: there’s no guarantee at the moment that it’s up our alley (especially since it has the dreaded “young adult” label stuck to it), but right now it sounds intriguing enough, so we’ll give it a whirl. (Besides, it’s not often we’re able to pass up on something involving a post-apocalyptic wasteland.)

The title in question is PURE, a book trilogy from author Julianna Baggott. Fox 2000 has set indie director James Ponsoldt (SMASHED) to write and direct the first installment.

Here’s the short version of what it’s about: Pure is set in a post-apocalyptic world divided into two societies: the Pures, who live under a dome and are healthy and beautiful, and the Wretches, those scarred by the devastation. In this world, Pressia, a Wretch on the run, teams up with the son of the leader of the Pures.

In a way, it sounds like THE TIME MACHINE, with a bit of WARM BODIES thrown in. As mentioned, we’ll keep tabs on this for now and see how it shapes up. Could end up being worthy, could end up being more TWILIGHT-esque rubbish.

Here’s the book’s lengthy synopsis:

Pressia barely remembers the Detonations or much about life during the Before. In her sleeping cabinet behind the rubble of an old barbershop where she lives with her grandfather, she thinks about what is lost–how the world went from amusement parks, movie theaters, birthday parties, fathers and mothers . . . to ash and dust, scars, permanent burns, and fused, damaged bodies. And now, at an age when everyone is required to turn themselves over to the militia to either be trained as a soldier or, if they are too damaged and weak, to be used as live targets, Pressia can no longer pretend to be small. Pressia is on the run.

There are those who escaped the apocalypse unmarked: Pures. They are tucked safely inside the Dome that protects their healthy, superior bodies. Yet Partridge, whose father is one of the most influential men in the Dome, feels isolated and lonely. Different. He thinks about loss–maybe just because his family is broken; his father is emotionally distant; his brother killed himself; and his mother never made it inside their shelter. Or maybe it’s his claustrophobia: his feeling that this Dome has become a swaddling of intensely rigid order. So when a slipped phrase suggests his mother might still be alive, Partridge risks his life to leave the Dome to find her.

When Pressia meets Partridge, their worlds shatter all over again.

The star of Ponsoldt’s SMASHED, Mary Elizabeth Winstead