EXCLUSIVE: Sony Pictures has preemptively acquired “H.A.V.E.N.“, a sci-fi short story by Carter Blanchard, who will pen an adaptation for the big screen.

While plot details for the film are under wraps, we’ve heard the story described as Men in Black meets Close Encounters of the Third Kind. It follows a woman who wakes up in a field with no memory of how she got there and learns that she’s been missing since 1976, yet hasn’t aged a day. She finds herself living in a world she no longer recognizes — all her friends and family, long gone — until learning she had a daughter who went missing with her in 1976, but never came back. A daughter who has been mysteriously erased from her memory.

“H.A.V.E.N.” was recently published by NeoText Corporation, the short form publishing company owned by Russell Ackerman, John Schoenfelder and Jay Schuninksy. Schoenfelder will produce the adaptation along with Lit Entertainment Group’s Adam Kolbrenner. Exec producers include Patrick White for Lit Entertainment Group, as well as Ackerman and Schuninksky. Peter Kang and Allie Broome will oversee for Sony Pictures.

Known for his ability to write horror, sci-fi and action with comedic undertones, Blanchard most recently wrote and exec produced Clown in a Cornfield, a horror thriller directed by Tucker & Dale vs. Evil’s Eli Craig and produced by Wyck Godfrey and Marty Bowen, the Temple Hill duo behind the Smile films. As we recently reported, RLJE Films and Shudder have snapped up U.S. rights to the film, which will get a wide theatrical release on May 9, 2025. Blanchard previously wrote the feature spec Glimmer that sold in a bidding war to Amblin. Other projects include Spy Hunter for Warner Bros, Mark Millar’s Kindergarten Heroes for Fox with producer Simon Kinberg, and adapting Brandon Sanderson’s bestselling novel Steelheart with Shawn Levy’s 21 Laps. “H.A.V.E.N.” is his first short story.

NeoText recently sold its short story “American Criminal” to Amazon Studios with Gavin O’Connor to direct and produce, along with Hidden Pictures, as well as “D.N.A.” to Amazon Studios with Simon Kinberg’s Genre Films on board.

Ackerman and Schoenfelder are also exec producers on the upcoming Netflix film The Electric State directed by the Russo Brothers, as well as They Will Kill You, directed by Kirill Sokolov for Nocturna, Skydance Entertainment, and New Line.

Kolbrenner’s credits include the Ryan Reynolds hit Free Guy, Chris Pratt’s The Tomorrow War, and the Denis Villeneuve thriller Prisoners, as well as next year’s The Gorge from Apple/Skydance.

Blanchard is repped by Verve, Lit Entertainment Group, and attorney Peter Grossman of Lichter, Grossman Nichols. NeoText is repped by attorney Robby Koch and Lit by attorney Barry Littman.