There once was a time when Eric Bana was negotiating to take the lead in heist thriller Brilliant for director Robert Luketic. That time was last October, but now things have changed and Gerard Butler will star instead.
Butler’s taking the role of a small-time criminal who teams up with a female thief and some other gangsters to pull off an audacious diamond heist. We’d guess that sparks will fly between the two as they sneak around buildings / go on the run from the cops / double cross their former partners or each other. That sort of thing always happens in these films.
The script is by Gillian Gorfil, who produced Blood Diamond. It’s said she sleeps on a bed of diamonds at night, like a screenwriting Bond villain. All right, so no one actually says that. But wouldn't it be fun if they did?
Back when the original Bana casting story arrived, there was talk of Cameron Diaz taking the female lead, but there's no suggestion she's still aboard. Given that Luketic paired Butler and Katherine Heigl in The Ugly Truth, could we see them back together? Probably not, to be honest. Heigl and action/comedy, as both Killers and One For The Money proved, don’t really mix well. But Butler’s definitely got the skills to pull this one off.
He’ll next crop up in Movie 43, Playing The Field and surfing drama Of Men And Mavericks (which saw him hospitalised with some nasty injuries). He’s also getting ready for more action with Hunter Killer and Thunder Ru****n.