Len Wiseman to direct 'Shell Game'

Lakeshore, Columbia team for sci-fi thriller

By TATIANA SIEGEL

Helmer Len Wiseman will make Lakeshore Entertainment and Columbia Pictures' "Shell Game" his next project.

Set in the future, the sci-fi action thriller follows a detective who is faced with a moral dilemma as he investigates the dangerous black-market business of immortality. Justin Bondi and Andrew Ludington wrote the original screenplay, while Wiseman and Chris Morgan penned the most recent draft.

Wiseman described "Shell Game" as a passion project.

"I've been wanting to make this film for the past five years, but it's a huge film and has always been too expensive to make at the level I've wanted to make it at," Wiseman said. "Now I'm finally getting a chance to do it at that level."

Wiseman, who directed "Live Free or Die Hard" to the highest box office haul of the franchise, is producing "Shell Game" alongside Lakeshore's Tom Rosenberg, Gary Lucchesi and Skip Williamson. JC Spink and Chris Bender exec produce.

Wiseman previously teamed with Lakeshore and Sony -- via its Screen Gems label -- on "Underworld" and "Underworld: Evolution," which he wrote and directed. Wiseman also is producing "Underworld: Rise of the Lycans."

Lakeshore is in pre-production on romantic comedy "The Ugly Truth," starring Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler and directed by Robert Luketic, as well as on the Jason Statham starrer "Crank: High Voltage."

Wiseman started his career in the art department on such special effects-laden features as "Godzilla," "Men in Black" and "Independence Day."

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