Director Frank Darabont (“The Mist,” “The Shawshank Redemption,” “The Green Mile”) tells STYD at the 35th Annual Saturn Awards that his film adaptation of Ray Bradbury’s seminal piece of social and political alarmism, “Fahrenheit 451,” remains a high priority for him.

But before you get too excited, Mr. Darabont went on to confirm the sad state of affairs modern cinema is in by saying, “That’s been a bit of a struggle. Hollywood doesn’t trust smart material… I actually had a studio head read that script and say: ‘Wow, that’s the best and smartest script that I’ve read since running this studio but I can’t possibly greenlight it.’ I asked why and he says ‘How am I going to get 13-year-olds to show up at the theater?’.”

But, there may be some hope for you Stephen King fans out there.  When asked about King’s “The Long Walk,” Darabont said, “‘It’s going to be coming up I think pretty shortly. But I’ll be making it, I’m sure, even more cheaply than “The Mist” because I don’t want to blow the material out of proportion. It’s such a very simple, weird, almost art film-like approach to telling a story.”