Report: New Director For BioShock Movie As Verbinski Steps Down

Gore Verbinksi, admirer of video games and director of Pirates of the Caribbean, has stepped down as director of the upcoming BioShock film, as 28 Weeks Later director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo takes the reins, Variety reported on Sunday. Verbinski will still be involved with the film as a producer, the report said. Verbinski in the past was named as the movie's director, but despite his apparent interest in video games and Take-Two-published BioShock in particular, overseas filming proved to be prohibitive to his schedule. The main reason that the movie switched to overseas shooting is due to advantageous tax credits and exchange rates outside of the US, the report said. Universal grew wary of a BioShock movie budget that reportedly rose to $160 million. Variety said that publisher Take-Two, owner of BioShock developers 2K Boston and 2K Australia, "maintains director approval" for a BioShock movie. Take-Two chair Strauss Zelnick, former president and COO of Twentieth Century Fox, in the past has expressed interest in leveraging appropriate video game properties into film.