“The Stolen Child” — Amazon.com’s First Feature Film

Amazon.com recently got into the movie making business and is ready to produce its first feature-length film based on the Keith Donahue fantasy novel titled “The Stolen Child.”

20th Century Fox will work with Amazon.com as the online retailer’s studio of choice for its first project, according to Variety. Fox will do all the heavy financial lifting for the film and Amazon.com will provide the lion’s share of promotional and advertising costs, getting the word out over its monster array of internet properties with daily visitors numbering in the multi-millions. This is just another indicator of the power of the Web for introducing company projects to audience numbers never before thought possible.

Ron Nyswaner (“Philadelphia,” “The Painted Veil”) will adapt the book for the big screen. Since he began writing the screenplay before the writer’s strike started, returning to it now allows the project to move forward unimpeded by the normal script start-up process.

The story centers on a man who was kidnapped by hobgoblins as a boy and replaced by a look-alike imposter. The book, and supposedly the film as well, follows both versions of the character as they struggle through their new lives and environments.