Zack Snyder's Rejected Netflix Adaptation Of 83-Year-Old Novel Would Be His "Magnum Opus"

Published Sep 19, 2026, 10:16 AM EDT

Abigail is an editor for ScreenRant, currently writing and editing movie news. You may also have seen her thoughts on animated television, musical theater, and fantasy literature in Paste Magazine, Fantasy Hive, or The Oxford Blue. She has also written SR lists and op-eds covering movies, TV, and books as well. She is an English major through and through, having graduated with a B.A. from UC Santa Barbara and an MPhil from Oxford University.

Zack Snyder finds himself in the middle of an intense response to his new movie, but remains committed to the idea of producing a particular page-to-screen adaptation.

Synder's The Last Photograph premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival this week, which is currently at an 18% critical approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The movie has been heavily criticized online owing to excessive violence, but Snyder is taking it in stride, discussing the backlash and defending his work in a new interview with Variety while also touching upon a shelved project.

This is The Fountainhead, Ayn Rand's controversial 1943 novel, which Snyder first announced his intention to adapt in 2016. "I've been trying to make The Fountainhead into a movie or into TV show because it's too long. I've written it," he said. Variety responded, "That's not going to help with the right-wing allegations," to which Synder said:

I was going to say! That's not going to help. But it's an undeniably great book. What people don't realize is that The Fountainhead in the 1950s was like Harry Potter now in terms of popularity. It was off the charts. Even just the why of that is worth it. And The Fountainhead is an insane melodrama. That'll probably be my magnum opus. I'll probably die on that one. And Escape From New York is what we’re working on right now.

The Fountainhead is about architect Howard Roark refusing to conform to convention, a story deeply about individualism. The novel is regarded as problematic by many because of its commitment to such an individualistic, anti-altruistic message, as well as a romanticized sexual assault scene. It was previously adapted into the 1949 film starring Gary Cooper.

Snyder himself seemingly believes that a steadier political climate is needed for a film to engage with these ideas, as in 2021, he told The New York Times that his Fountainhead was "on the back burner." He directly stated: "We need a less divided country and a little more liberal government to make that movie, so people don't react to it in a certain way."

However, in 2024, Snyder shared that Netflix rejected his pitch for a television adaptation of The Fountainhead, saying they believed it was too "taboo" for them. At the time, he acknowledged allegations of The Fountainhead being a "fascist propaganda piece," but stated that he personally likes it because he sees it as "a direct comment on making a movie."

His comparison of The Fountainhead to Harry Potter is exaggerated, but the book did steadily gain wider notice over time following a quiet initial release, and it has reportedly sold 10 million copies worldwide as of 2023 (the Harry Potter series has sold over 600 million books in its 29-year tenure). 1949's The Fountainhead also has a strong 80% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Snyder also references his confirmed upcoming reboot of John Carpenter and Kurt Russell's 1981 cult classic Escape From New York. Zack Snyder's Justice League and Rebel Moon caused very particular cultural moments in recent years — we have yet to see something from him that is universally critically acclaimed, but Escape From New York and The Fountainhead will likely provoke a major reaction of some kind, if nothing else, if they ever come to fruition.