Is this any way to pay back a director you worked with before? Despite John Woo gearing up for production next spring on the WWII epic “Flying Tigers,” Tom Cruise who has longed to play a pilot in a war film, has hired a writer to tackle the exact same subject matter in a project for 20th Century Fox and New Regency.
Kirk Ellis (“John Adams”) has been tasked to rewrite a script by Christopher McQuarrie (“The Usual Suspects,” “Valkyrie”) and Mason Alley. The McQuarrie script has been banging around for a couple of years now, but Cruise seems eager to see if it can take shape into something he could sign on to. However, a couple of things should be noted. Firstly, Cruise usually has a number of projects in development for him at any given time and likes to have a few different options before settling on a decision. Second, in these kind of situations with two similar projects in development at the same, whichever one gets made first usually wins. Look no further than the abandoned Doug Liman helmed “The Three Musketeers” earlier this year (instead we’ll get Paul W.S. Anderson’s version, sigh).
So why so much heat around the material? Well, it tells the courageous story of General Claire Chennault who assembled a volunteer fighter squadron to help the Chinese fight the Japanese before the U.S.’s involvement in WWII. And Deadline clears up one thing we were wondering about Woo’s film which is being co-produced by IMAX; it won’t be shot in IMAX, but he footage will be “remastered” for those ginormous screens.
And as a final side note. Remember the story about the comedy film “El Presidente” that would have had Cruise and Jack Nicholson reteaming? Looks like Cruise was never officially atttached. Bummer. [Deadline]