SAFETY NOT GUARANTEED Team Behind FLIGHT OF THE NAVIGATOR Remake

Has anyone watched Flight of the Navigator lately? Does it hold up? I was infatuated with that movie as a child, and from the fuzzy distance of nostalgia, I still think it's a really great story that could be retold in an interesting way: 12-year-old David falls down and hits his head on July 4th, waking up seemingly moments later to discover eight years have passed and he hasn't aged a day. As his now older family tries to figure out what to do with him, scientists discover a nearby spaceship. David is held in the same research facility as the UFO (being cared for by a young Sarah Jessica Parker!), and he befriends the UFO's robot pilot Max (Paul Reubens!), and then David is taken into the spaceship with Max and a bunch of other cool stuff happens.

So! The guys behind Safety Not Guaranteed, this year's incredibly charming time travel comedy (my review here), have been tapped to take over the remake of the 1986 film. Director Colin Trevorrow and writer Derek Connolly have been hired by Disney to rewrite the remake, with the potential for Trevorrow to direct. They'll be rewriting the script's first draft, from Arrested Development and The Inbetweeners writer Brad Copeland. 

I think Flight of the Navigator is prime remake material. It's got enough nostalgia cachet to warrant interest, but it's certainly not untouchable. And hiring the team behind Safety Not Guaranteed makes a lot of sense, as the films share a certain sensibility, even beyond the time travel angle. They're both sci-fi films on the surface that are much more about isolated characters who already feel as if they are from another time, and they're both comedies that trade in earnestness without losing the laughs.

Who knows if this remake will be something adults will want to watch - I'm not even sure if the original is something I'd enjoy as an adult. But hopefully it will mean as much to today's kids as the original did to me.