I bet the studios’ first choice for the role of Gil will be Bruce Willis. And they could cast Lindsay Lohan as the girl who starves to death while wireheading.
When I read the OP, Legacy of Heorot was what I instantly thought of. But it would be very dependent on how the grendals are.
The catch is that they’d likely decide that they have a built-in sequal, and I try not to speak of Beowulf’s Children.
I think that Mote would be much more interesting than Footfall.
I agree.
I’ve wanted to see the moties in action for so long that sometimes I just watch Gremins in reverse to get a weak fix. 
I have a 1975 edition of Ringworld that has an illustration of a puppeteer on the inside cover. The puppeteer in Snowboarder Bo’s link looks a tad anorexic compared to mine.
What didn’t you like about Beowulf’s Children? I thought it was perfectly amusing.
Legacy was my favorite book for a very long time. I even made a game out of it in 8th grade (I’ve since lost that) for a book report. When I stumbled across Beowulf’s Children ages after my first reading of Legacy I was very excited. And then bitterly disappointed.
Honestly, Pythian Habenero, it’s been a long time since I’ve read either. I just recall hating it. Intensely. Enough that even as I reread Legacy, I never picked it up again. I still own it though…
Maybe after I finish Harry Potter I’ll look into it again.
Oh, but Sylvia did get with Weyland despite her promise to Terry AND despite her cursing Terry after he died for not releasing her from said promise. There was no real explanation of that. I mean, I don’t think it was wrong for her to become Weyland’s second wife given that Terry was dead. But, really, if it was important to her to keep the promise after his death, when and why did that change? That’s not an important detail, I suppose, but it did kind of break the flow. And it’s the first detail off the top of my head that jumped out at me as sucky from such a long time ago.
I always thought that A Gift From Earth would make a great movie. You have a teen aged rebel, a repressive society, a fantastic landscape in Mt. Lookitthat, car chases. It wouldn’t even require a large special effects or cgi budget. I could see somebody like Haley Joel Osment as the male lead. I think he’s old enough now.
Really, the only thing I remember clearly about Beowulf’s Children is that the scary artificial guy tames a grendel. Which was lame yet cool. But I do remember that I rather liked it, especially the scenes from grendel POV.
Oh, yes, the scary artificial guy. The one who was run out of the mainland settlement for killing Weyland, but who they had to take back in because the grendal was tamed by him. That was also terrible. But I had forgotten that they did scenes from the grendal’s POV, and that was pretty cool.
That would work well as a short film - no need for any f/x other than fog. I especially loved the way that the main character is finding out about the effects of fog after he’s drifted into another world, already.
Another one of Niven’s stories that would work really well, I think would be Night on Mispec Moor. A mercenary battle that turns into something else would be fun. And the protagonist’s solution for his problem is just so apropros. Come to think of it, for a movie the story would have to be expanded a bit - certainly at least one other character would have to be added. One person films are not very enjoyable as a rule.