Ever since the "World War Z" film synopsis hit the Internets last month, the most loyal fans of the beloved Max Brooks novel have been up in arms about the fact that the movie is trading out Brooks' post-war setting in favor of having star Brad Pitt's character, a U.N. staffer, fight to stop the Zombie pandemic from wiping out the entire population.

MTV News recently caught up with director Marc Forster during the Toronto International Film Festival where he was promoting his upcoming film "Machine Gun Preacher" to find out how he is approaching the translation of Brooks' novel from page to big screen.

"The idea, obviously the book is not written as a narrative, you try to take things from the book, but at same time you're changing certain things," Forster explained. "I do feel we're trying to keep it in the spirit of the book because it's important.

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"Machine Gun Preacher." That's a helluva title, isn't it? It's an upcoming "based on truth" story directed by Marc Forster and starring Gerard Butler. The actor told MTV contributor Ryan Downey all about the planned 2012 release when the two chatted last week at the press junket for "How To Train Your Dragon," which hits theaters tomorrow.

"It's an incredible story," he said. He's right too-- it's pretty wacky. Hit the jump for Butler's lengthy explanation. Read More...

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Marc ForsterAlthough Marc Forster has directed many movies we’ve all seen, from “Finding Neverland” to the licensed to kill blockbuster “Quantum of Solace,” he’s resisted becoming an auteur -- a filmmaker who doesn't let us forget that he’s behind the camera -- a la Stanley Kubrick, Kevin Smith and others. In his latest offering, Forster is breaking several of his own rules, including taking command of the lens from both sides.

“[While filming ‘Solace’] I realized that the only time I had for me, which was quiet and calm, was on an airplane,” Forster explained of his mind-blowingly trippy new short. It's something that has to be seen to be believed, and you can check it out over at the website for Swiss International Air Lines. “It was the only moment where I could reflect and be myself… there’s a nice symbolism in the meaning of journey.” Read More...

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Daniel Craig in 'Quantum of Solace'The Daniel Craig era of James Bond films kicked off a sea change for the franchise, confronting an era of modern-day terrorist operations and mixed national and corporate loyalties. Keeping Bond's adventures timely and relevant isn't the only challenge confronting filmmakers, though, according to the director from "Quantum of Solace." Keeping audiences wowed by Bond film locales is also becoming increasingly difficult.

"In a sense, Bond films lived because of locations," director Marc Forster told MTV News. "They’re sort of characters in the movies, so to find Bond locations these days is getting trickier and trickier." Read More...

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Marc Forster"Quantum of Solace" director Marc Forster lifted Khaled Hosseini's first novel "The Kite Runner" to a new plateau of prominence when the film came out in 2007. The hot-button political and cultural issues that the story touched on, however, resulted in a delayed release of what was already a daunting project to put together.

Forster is currently looking ahead to his next film "World War Z," but said that he looked at Hosseini's second book "A Thousand Splendid Suns," currently being developed at Columbia Pictures, opting to pass because he wasn't ready to go through the gauntlet of demands posed by "Kite Runner" without some time on other movies.

"I met early on," Forster told MTV News. "They gave me an early copy and said, ‘Look, would you want to do it?’" Read More...

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Kurt CobainMarc Forster is looking ahead to "World War Z" and other possible projects following his first James Bond film "Quantum of Solace." A biopic about Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain, though, is not one of those projects, contrary to speculation.

"That’s not correct," Forster told MTV News regarding claims that he would step on to direct a Kurt Cobain movie at Universal. The film is reportedly being scripted by "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" screenwriter and former Forster collaborator on "The Kite Runner" David Benioff.

Though Forster brushed off his involvement with the Cobain biopic, which incidentally will not star James McAvoy, as "a rumor," he expressed high hopes for the picture to be done well. Read More...

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Daniel Craig in 'Quantum of Solace'"Quantum of Solace" director Marc Forster wanted to complete a tale that took James Bond movies into new territory. With the 22nd second Bond flick out on shelves this week on DVD and Blu-Ray, and Forster looking ahead to his adaptation of the zombie apocalypse novel "World War Z," no director has been attached to the unnamed the 23rd installment. Even though Forster declined an invitation to return, he expressed hope that his darker Bond vision would lay the groundwork for a lighter follow-up.

"They asked me if I wanted to," Forster told MTV News. "I’ll never say never again, but at this point I would say no." Read More...

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'World War Z'One of the most hotly anticipated zombie (or is that post-zombie?) books finally has a director! According to Variety, the adaptation of Max Brooks' insanely popular "World War Z" has snagged Bond helmer Marc Forster for the job. It's like they didn't think it was buzzworthy enough, what with J. Michael Straczynski writing the script, and Brad Pitt's Plan B producing.

If you haven't read the book, "World War Z" is a seriously detailed, often creepy account of the zombie apocalypse that wiped out humanity in the 2010s. Compiled by a U.N. Postwar Commission researcher, its a first-person retelling of the war that wiped out every country on the map. Forster was drawn to the project for its journalistic style. "The genre always fascinated me, and when they pitched it to me, it reminded me of the paranoid conspiracy films of the '70s like 'All the President's Men.'" Read More...

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