Lord of the Flies to be remade with all-female cast

Adaptation is already under fire as critics say Warner Bros have ignored the central themes of the novel

A still from the 1990 adaptation of Lord of the Flies (YouTube/Screengrab)

Warner Bros has announced it is making an all-female adaptation of Lord of the Flies, with Scott McGehee and David Siegel lined up to direct.

The film will be based on the novel by William Golding, which depicts a group of boarding school boys stranded on a desert island without any adults.

It has previously been adapted by director Peter Brook in 1963, and by Harry Hook in 1990.

Speaking to Deadline, Siegel said: "We want to do a very faithful but contemporized adaptation of the book, but our idea was to do it with all girls rather than boys.

"It is a timeless story that is especially relevant today, with the interpersonal conflicts and bullying, and the idea of children forming a society and replicating the behaviour they saw in grownups before they were marooned."

McGehee said: "It shifts things in a way that might help people see the story anew. It breaks away from some of the conventions, the ways we think of boys and aggression."

Warner Bros announcement has already attracted criticism online by many who believe that the idea of an all-female cast would entirely ignore the central themes of the original text.

American writer and commentator Roxane Gay wrote on Twitter: "An all women remake of Lord of the Flies makes no sense because... the plot of that book wouldn't happen with all women."

Courney Enlow, who has written for the likes of Vanity Fair, Bustle and Glarmour, quipped: "A thousand words on how they already did an all-girl Lord of the Flies and called it Mean Girls."

The script is yet to be written, but McGehee said he and Siegel were "super eager to put pen to paper". A release date and cast are also yet to be announced.