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Here's What The Movie Version Of 'The Secret' Should Be

Reid Nakamura |
January 28, 2015 | 7:13 p.m. PST

Film Editor

How does a self-help book become a movie? (Twitter/@thesecret)
How does a self-help book become a movie? (Twitter/@thesecret)
The best-selling self-help book “The Secret” is going to be a movie. Technically, it was already a movie—the book is based on an instructional self-help film—but now it’s going to be a scripted movie for the first time, according to The Hollywood Reporter

“The Secret” is a 2006 book by Rhonda Byrne that posits that the world is governed by the law of attraction. It suggests that a person’s life could be improved through the power of positive thinking: Think of good things and good things will happen. 

The massively successful book sold millions of copies in dozens of languages and attracted the attention of everyone from Oprah to “Saturday Night Live,” so it was only a matter of time before it someone brought it to the big screen. But what will the movie be about? What tone will it take? Who will star? Let’s speculate:

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Version 1: Action Thriller

This one might be a little bit of a stretch, but then again so is the law of attraction. 

Will Smith stars as an ordinary man who one day wakes up with the ability to conjure anything and everything that pops into his head. At first, he’s confused and a little bit scared, but it’s not long before he starts to see the positive side of his new ability. He uses it to impress the ladies and get everything he’s ever wanted.  Then suddenly, the negative thoughts begin and everything starts to spiral. Droughts, plagues, gangs of bandits. He tries to run, but the only way he can get his life back is to think happy thoughts.

Version 2: Historical Drama

“The Secret” claims that the great men of history all achieved their greatness by harnessing The Secret. Everyone from Beethoven to Martin Luther King Jr. supposedly used The Secret to better their lives and the world around them. Sounds like an excellent idea for a movie.

Think “What to Expect When You’re Expecting.” A bunch of parallel storylines that each tell the story of a historical figure discovering the law of attraction and using it to turn their life around. The only limit to the number of characters is how many faces can fit on one poster. Chris Evans as Plato? Eddie Redmayne as Ralph Waldo Emerson? Bradley Cooper as Winston Churchill? It doesn’t have to make sense, they’re only on screen for five minutes each.

READ MORE: Do Movies Have An Obligation To Always Get The Facts Right?

Version 3: Romantic Comedy

Of all three, this one seems the most likely. Byrne will help produce the film, so it’s unlikely that it’ll take anything but the most positive and uplifting tone.

Drew Barrymore re-teams “Never Been Kissed” director Raja Gosnell (who is attached to direct) and stars as a driven career woman with no time for a personal life. She’s achieved everything she ever set her mind to, but she just can’t seem to find love. One day, after a drunken conversation with her quirky best friend in which she describes the man of her dreams, the perfect man happens to stumble into her life. Ultimately, she realizes that she can’t focus on only her work if she wants to be truly happy.

It’s every rom-com you’ve ever seen, basically.

Reach Film Editor Reid Nakamura here.



 

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