Frank Marshall to Adapt Jeffrey Archer's A MATTER OF HONOR

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Producer Frank Marshall to Adapt Jeffrey Archer’s Action-Thriller A MATTER OF HONOR for the Big Screen

By Adam Chitwood

Published Sep 13, 2011

Frank Marshall to Adapt Jeffrey Archer's A MATTER OF HONOR. The British espionage book is the first in a planned franchise from the Bourne producer.

Frank Marshall, the producer behind the Back to the Future franchise, Indiana Jones, and the Bourne series, is looking to pick up his next big multi-film series. Marshall is set to develop novelist Jeffrey Archer’s British spy novel A Matter of Honor into a feature film for New Franchise Media. THR reports that Matter of Honor is the first in a planned franchise that takes place in the world of international espionage in the 1960’s and 70’s. The book centers on Adam Scott, an unemployed British ex-army officer who comes between two rival intelligence agencies that are in pursuit of an object integral to the balance of global power.

Marshall’s a very smart guy, and the material seems ripe for a sharp feature film adaptation. If the producer can assemble a team that can bring some weight to the books as well as a unique visual style (which is exactly what he did with Bourne), then we could be in for something really cool. No director is currently attached, but a shortlist of screenwriters has been assembled and a first draft should be written over the coming months while Marshall is busy with production on The Bourne Legacy. Hit the jump to read a synopsis of Archer’s novel.

Here’s the synopsis for A Matter of Honor:

In 1966, Adam Scott, an unemployed British ex-army officer with an uncertain future, attends the reading of his disgraced father's will. Part of his inheritance is a letter detailing the events of Hermann Goering's suicide and two unopened letters from the Nazi general giving him access to a Swiss bank vault and the valuable Russian icon it contains. However, a veritable state secret is concealed in the painting and the KGB and the CIA both want it before the expiry of a crucial deadline. Scott's perilous journey across Europe to the questionable safety of England is by plane, car, foot, bus, ambulance, van, and ferry as he stays one step ahead of death with the assistance of farmers, salesmen, racing cyclists, hoodlums, and an entire orchestra. An epic chase thriller tidily concluded with a series of neat twists. [Amazon]