Today's Film News: Cusack is the Last Man Standing

By Katey Rich

John Cusack has been in a bit of a small movie rut lately, with the ignored Martian Child, the even-more-ignored Grace is Gone, and the upcoming stink bomb War, Inc. So maybe a big-budget apocalyptic thriller and Roland Emmerich can help shake him out of the doldrums. He'll star along with Chiwetel Ejiofor in 2012, reports Variety, about a cataclysmic event that leaves only a few survivors on the planet. Given the options for repopulating the planet, Cusack and Ejiofor don't seem like bad places to start.

It's been a while since "based on a novel by John Grisham" was a common tagline in Hollywood, but now the king of the legal drama is heading back to the big screen with a very different tome. Playing for Pizza, about an NFL quarterback finding new life in Parma, Italy, has been picked up for adaptation by Phoenix Pictures, according to The Hollywood Reporter. We'll see if the producers can resist throwing in a few tense courtroom scenes, just for old time's sake.

Screenwriter Wang Hui-Ling has told excellent stories set during China's recent (Lust, Caution) and mythical past (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon), and now it's time to see how one of the most famous directors born in that country can handle one of Wang's stories. John Woo, usually known for his action movie, will direct Wang's script 1949, a big-budget romantic epic set in the last years of the Chinese civil war. Variety says the release is scheduled for December 2009, coinciding with the 60th anniversary of the People's Republic of China (and probably coming after the hype and controversy over the Chinese Olympics have faded, or at least they're hoping).

And finally, with Indiana Jones coming out on Thursday, it's time for me to get worked up over another movie with epic aspirations. Now that the trailer for Baz Luhrmann's Australia is over at Apple, I think I've found my candidate. Yes, The Changeling and Che are the American fall releases getting all the buzz over at Cannes, but sheer visual thrills in the Australia trailer are enough to keep me excited for months. Who knew we needed a new Gone with the Wind-style epic? Yes, I know that Indy's response has taught us a thing or two about lowering expectations (more on that later), but for now Australia remains at the top of the must-see list.