Next year marks the 200th birthday of Charles Dickens, and director Mike Newell's present to the classic author is a new big-screen remake of 'Great Expectations' starring Helena Bonham Carter and Ralph Fiennes. However, the film will be much darker with more thrills than the original novel.

According to the movie's screenwriter David Nicholls, changes in the classic book's tone and ending will differentiate this latest adaptation from previous film versions, such as the 1998 effort starring Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman.

Nicholls told reporters that the film will be treated "as a thriller" and the scenes in which Pip meets Miss Haversham will be “a bit like going to see Hannibal Lector."

As for the ending, Nicholls says the screenplay splits the difference between Dickens' original dark and bleak ending and the sentimental and romantic ending Dickens' later revised to make his story more palatable to the public.

With Carter and Fiennes so used to playing the creeper roles, and playing the roles of Miss Haversham and the convict Magwitch, it seems we're all in for a treat.

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