Indie producer Platinum Image Film has optioned the screenplay for The Last Days of Pompeii from British writer Henry Cobbold to produce a sword-and-sandals epic feature from director Sergio Navarretta.

The script is based on the 1834 novel of the same name by Edward Bulwer-Lytton.

Platinum Image’s Navarretta told Playback Daily he was talking with Cobbold of UK-based AD1 Productions last year and discovered the screenwriter is a distant relative of Lytton, and had written a romancer set against the cataclysmic destruction of Pompeii that closely followed the 1834 book.

“The movie is not about the explosions in Pompeii. It’s a love story with Vesuvius in the background,” the director explained.

The movie, budgeted at $30 million, will have visual effects from UK-based Red Vision VFX, with David Mousley producing.

The producers liken their adaptation to the suspense of the 2007 epic drama 300, which was also effects-driven.

Cobbold, Mousley, Navarretta, Alessandra Piccione will produce the Canadian film.

No word on casting.

Photo of Vesuvius by Pastorius.