In October, we reported that Warner Bros. and producer Joel Silver had acquired the rights to Ross Macdonald's Lew Archer mystery novels with the hopes of turning the series into a film franchise.  The first film would be based on the eighth Archer book, 1959's The Galton Case.  Today, Deadline reports that the studio has hired Peter Landesman to write the screenplay.In The Galton Case, "Archer is hired to track down the lost heir to the Galton fortune. His path leads him through a trail of murder, deception and a tangle of secrets."  The Galton Case wouldn't be Archer's first trip to the big screen.  The character was previously by Paul Newman in 1966′s Harper and 1975′s The Drowning Pool.  Hit the jump for more on Landesman.Landesman is a former New York Times foreign correspondent who's expose on sex trafficking was used as the basis for the 2007 Kevin Kline drama Trade.  Landesman recently wrote The Mission for Warner Bros.  Per Deadline,

That film is about Operation Jaque, a daring rescue of 15 captives that included former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt from FARC militants who moved the hostages around in the Colombian jungles some of them being held as long as 15 years.

As we reported in September, David O. Russell was circling the project as a possible follow-up to The Silver Linings Playbook, and Warners were aiming to have Brad Pitt star (just like every other studio for any project they have).

Landesman also wrote a film based on Mark Felt, the FBI's second-in-command formerly known as "Deep Throat" who was instrumental in helping reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein uncover the Watergate conspiracy.  I'm curious if that project mentions that far from being a selfless figure, Felt was making a play to become the director of the FBI.