Though she appears in the upcoming Jack Kerouac adaptation On the Road, Amy Adams is gearing up to tackle an adaptation of a different sort.  Variety reports that Adams is in negotiations to star in an adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s novel Dark Places.  The film centers on a woman who, at the age of 7, “survives the massacre of her family and testifies against her brother as the murderer. Twenty-five years later, a group obsessed with solving notorious crimes confronts her with questions about the crime.”  Gilles Paquet-Brenner (Sarah Keys) wrote the script and is set to direct the decidedly dark drama.

Adams recently wrapped the Superman reboot Man of Steel as well as the baseball drama Trouble with the Curve with Clint Eastwood.  She’s currently shooting Spike Jonze’s untitled next film, and she’ll be seen this fall in Paul Thomas Anderson’s long-awaited The Master.  Hit the jump for a synopsis of Dark Places.

Mixing historical realities with a fictional modern discovery is a difficult combination to pull off. Writer/director Gilles Paquet-Brenner is helped along by thrilling source material that is based around a little known event in France’s grim times under the occupation of Nazi control in the heat of World War II. Sarah’s Key is bolstered by an engrossing turn by Kristen Scott Thomas and a swift kick of an ending that will leave audiences with sincere emotion. The film also keeps much of what made Tatiana de Rosnay’s novel so alluring with the back and forth between the present and the past, and the result is pulled off with absolute confidence. Hit the jump for my full review.

We’ve barely dipped our toes into the first weekend of the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival and we’re already bringing you news in regards to film purchases.  Yesterday, The Weinstein Company preemptively bought all U.S. rights to the French film Sarah’s Key (or Elle s’appelait Sarah) starring Oscar nominee Kristin Scott Thomas (The English Patient).  Helmed by co-writer/director Gilles Paquet-Brenner (Pretty Things), the film is an adaptation of the New York Times best-selling novel of the same name by Tatiana De Rosnay.

According to the press release, Sarah’s Key spans a period of almost seventy years and tells the story of an American journalist (Kristin Scott Thomas) who is investigating the 1942 Vel’d'Hiv’ Roundup of Jewish families in Paris.  For more details on the buy, hit the jump for the full press release and a synopsis for the film.  Sarah’s Key will screen in Toronto on three separate occasions beginning next Thursday, September 16th.