As Damon Lindelof incurred with “Prometheus” the vitriolic fanbase appetizer to this weekend's Bat-activities, “Lost” co-showrunner Carlton Cuse must have felt pretty good with his decision to shun the spotlight after their show's end. However, as New Line has spent the last year putting together a new earthquake flick to no avail, Cuse finally looks ready to face the admittedly unknown quotient of disaster film aficionados.
Last month, progress on the Beau Flynn-produced “San Andreas 3D” moved forward with news that Brad Peyton (“Journey 2: The Mysterious Island”) had been hired to direct, but after the studio felt unhappy with the latest draft by “The Dilemma” scribe Allan Loeb, they've now brought on Cuse to deliver a full rewrite. The plot follows a man travelling from San Francisco to Los Angeles during an earthquake in order to reconcile with his children and wife, but perhaps Loeb was simply focusing too much on that family element and less on the bits where they should've just hired Roland Emmerich as a one-man crew instead.
“San Andreas 3D” will be one of the few feature writing credits Cuse has taken on, as he's traditionally acted as more of a producer for projects such as the upcoming “Psycho” prequel “The Bates Motel,” and if it seems beneath him… you'd probably be right. However, there are some merits to a well-executed disaster film, as “The Poseidon Adventure” and “Twister” can show, so let's just hope he's observed carefully his “Lost”-mate's relationship to that show's following, and looks at that third act maybe one more time. [Variety]