Mandate Pictures, in partnership with Sam Raimi and Rob Tapert, has won a rights package to do a new version of The Day of the Triffids in a recent auction, according to Deadline.

The bidding war included Warner Bros. and David Yates (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows).

The deal was for seven figures, reportedly the most Mandate has ever paid for a package. Raimi (Drag Me To Hell) would like to direct it, as the original film was one of his boyhood favorites. Ghost House and Angry Films will produce.

The 1951 novel by John Wyndham, upon which the 1962 film was also based, is included in the deal. In the novel, a meteorite shower blinds anyone that looks at it. Since it is such a beautiful spectacle, 99 percent of the Earths population is blinded as a result. Chaos soon results from the escape of some Triffids, experimental plants capable of autonomous movement, who then proceed to attack people.

In the original film, the Triffids are aliens. There is no indication as to whether the project will adhere to the novel or the original film.

Several other adaptations have been done, including a 1957 radio dramatization, a 1981 television serial and a 2009 two-part television miniseries, all under the auspices of the BBC.