GEARS OF WAR Movie Looks For New Studio

Back in 2007, a year after Gears of War first hit shelves and became a big hit on the XBox, plans for a movie were underway. Total Recall remake director Len Wiseman was in talks to direct, and Chris Morgan (Fast Five) and Billy Ray (The Hunger Games) had taken a crack at the screenplay.

Now Variety reports that New Line Cinema, the company which held the movie rights, is letting the property go to concentrate on the upcoming Hobbit trilogy, leaving the Gears of War producers looking for a new home. Stuart Beattie (Collateral) wrote the most recent version of the script, and Twilight producers Marty Bowen and Wyck Godfrey were at one point attached to this movie, but it seems that they've moved on as well. Beattie, who also wrote a draft of Halo that never ended up getting made, seems to be the go-to guy for video game adaptations like this.

Epic Games will keep an eye on the movie as it goes forward, making sure that the storyline stays in line with the created mythology that has already been established in the first three games and the fourth one that hits shelves next year.

Personally, I think Wreck-It Ralph might be the closest thing we ever get to a great video game movie, and I'm not so sure any studio will be able to pull this one off unless they get a hugely talented creative team behind it (read: NOT Len Wiseman). But the likelihood of a Chris Nolan or David Fincher or someone of equal status coming on board a project like this is slim, so - and I hate to be pessimistic about this - but Gears of War will probably end up like almost every other video game movie and just be another disappointment to fans. We'll wait to reserve full judgment until we see who comes on board and what kind of treatment the film version gets (if it ever gets made at all), but I'd say you probably shouldn't get your hopes up.