One of the nation’s best-selling authors, Giddens Ko (柯景騰), also known as Jiu Ba-dao (九把刀), confirmed yesterday that a major studio in the US has purchased the rights to produce a screenplay based on his work, marking possibly the first time a local author’s story has been adapted into a Hollywood film.
The Killer Who Never Kills, a novel first published in 2005 that sold more than 100,000 copies nationwide, consists of two stories.
One of those stories has been sold to Hollywood, Ko said.
“If I could have a say on who plays the lead role of my novel, I would say Jay Chou (周杰倫), but obviously I am not the one making that decision,” Ko said, referring to the Taiwanese pop singer and actor who plays Seth Rogen’s sidekick in The Green Hornet.
The story sold to Hollywood follows the life of a killer who actually never kills anyone, but instead uses deceit to give the appearance that he has fulfilled his mission.
Ko refused to disclose any details of the deal, citing a confidentiality agreement.
Ko’s noted achievements include writing up to 5,000 words per day and publishing 14 novels in as many months. His prolific career started when he wrote a short story as part of his application to get into a local graduate school. It was then that he discovered his talent for writing.
At the age of 32, Ko has already published 56 novels, many of which have topped the best-seller charts. Some have been adapted for television soap operas, comic books and video games.
He has never experienced “writer’s block,” he said, adding that he thinks writing a novel is a process of talking to himself, a journey he finds “extremely lonely.”
Police have issued warnings against traveling to Cambodia or Thailand when others have paid for the travel fare in light of increasing cases of teenagers, middle-aged and elderly people being tricked into traveling to these countries and then being held for ransom. Recounting their ordeal, one victim on Monday said she was asked by a friend to visit Thailand and help set up a bank account there, for which they would be paid NT$70,000 to NT$100,000 (US$2,136 to US$3,051). The victim said she had not found it strange that her friend was not coming along on the trip, adding that when she
TRAGEDY: An expert said that the incident was uncommon as the chance of a ground crew member being sucked into an IDF engine was ‘minuscule’ A master sergeant yesterday morning died after she was sucked into an engine during a routine inspection of a fighter jet at an air base in Taichung, the Air Force Command Headquarters said. The officer, surnamed Hu (胡), was conducting final landing checks at Ching Chuan Kang (清泉崗) Air Base when she was pulled into the jet’s engine for unknown reasons, the air force said in a news release. She was transported to a hospital for emergency treatment, but could not be revived, it said. The air force expressed its deepest sympathies over the incident, and vowed to work with authorities as they
A tourist who was struck and injured by a train in a scenic area of New Taipei City’s Pingsi District (平溪) on Monday might be fined for trespassing on the tracks, the Railway Police Bureau said yesterday. The New Taipei City Fire Department said it received a call at 4:37pm on Monday about an incident in Shifen (十分), a tourist destination on the Pingsi Railway Line. After arriving on the scene, paramedics treated a woman in her 30s for a 3cm to 5cm laceration on her head, the department said. She was taken to a hospital in Keelung, it said. Surveillance footage from a
INFRASTRUCTURE: Work on the second segment, from Kaohsiung to Pingtung, is expected to begin in 2028 and be completed by 2039, the railway bureau said Planned high-speed rail (HSR) extensions would blanket Taiwan proper in four 90-minute commute blocs to facilitate regional economic and livelihood integration, Railway Bureau Deputy Director-General Yang Cheng-chun (楊正君) said in an interview published yesterday. A project to extend the high-speed rail from Zuoying Station in Kaohsiung to Pingtung County’s Lioukuaicuo Township (六塊厝) is the first part of the bureau’s greater plan to expand rail coverage, he told the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times). The bureau’s long-term plan is to build a loop to circle Taiwan proper that would consist of four sections running from Taipei to Hualien, Hualien to
RSS