'Gears of War' Gets a Director

Len Wiseman, probably best known as the guy who sleeps with Kate Beckinsale but who actually has professional highlights as well, has been named the director of the upcoming video game adaptation, Gears of War. Variety reported the story Monday night. Wiseman's previous films as a director, Live Free and Die Hard and the two Underworld films, have grossed around $600 million worldwide. The selection marks the first time in recent memory that a director believed to be in the running for a project actually gets the job three months later. Yea, rumormongers!  A few things we should point out, though: Gears of War will come to us from New Line, which at this point in time is a bit like FEMA rebuilding your hurricane-ravaged city. I mean, the entire company has been restructured and we're not exactly sure what we're going to get out of them. New Line has been aggressive, though, since being vivisected by Warner Bros., but perhaps that's just a Napoleon Complex rearing its ugly head. Another noteworthy item is that the screenplay by Stuart Beattie (Collateral, 30 Days of Night) is being retooled by Chris Morgan. I dunno, perhaps Beattie isn't "of the moment" enough now. Morgan, on the other hand, helped adapt Wanted, which is about as right now as you can get. Finally, Cliff Bleszinski, who was on the team that created the video game, will executive produce the film and serve as a consultant. That should mean a greater measure of authenticity from one medium to the next, but frankly, that kind of thing isn't truly possible. They can shoot for a high degree of verisimilitude, but anytime a game is adapted, it will have obvious and far-stretching compromises in the name of telling a dramatic story and giving it an arc and all that other stuff. But if you're a fan of Gears of War and you've been waiting and waiting for the movie, get used to that part of the process.

"It's like with our games, you can have it right or have it right now," said Epic Games' Mark Rein. "We want to get it right. There's no timetable for us. We just want to make as good a movie as we can, and we think (Wiseman's) the guy who will do it."

So that means it won't pop up in theaters next summer as once believed. Probably give it 30-36 months, I'd say.