Update: Deadline adds that “The Samurai” will center on “a rogue assassin named Townes Joyce, who breaks out of a Texas jail that puts him on the run from an international manhunt. Along the way, he gets involved with a woman and her child, and they go along for a ride that spans Costa Rica, Colombia, Paris and back to the U.S.” O’Connor is also working with Tambakis on a stage version of the classic “The Hustler.”
While Gavin O’Connor‘s rousing MMA fighter drama “Warrior” didn’t quite get the love it deserved at the box office earlier this month despite some glowing reviews, the writer/director appears to have already decided on his next project.
Sources tell The Playlist that O’Connor and co-writer Michael J. Wilson (“Ice Age,” “Sharktale“) have sold their spec script “The Samurai” to Warner Bros. in a deal that closed earlier this week. Details on the project are slim right now, but it’s said to be a “brutal” lightning fast thriller, with international locations, and also features a love story as part of the plot. O’Conner is a familiar face on the WB lot, having directed the cop drama “Pride & Glory” for their genre shingle New Line, and he’s currently working on another script for the studio with “Warrior” co-writer Anthony Tambakis entitled “Victory.”
As for Wilson, besides creating the story and characters for “Ice Age” franchise, he’s been on a bit of a hot streak of late. Last fall he sold the spec script “Tiki” he co-wrote with Ahmet Zappa (“The Odd Life of Timothy Green“) to Disney. And he’s also behind “Inventory,” a thriller announced a couple years ago with Bruce Willis attached in which the star would play a cop who goes undercover in AA as an “alcoholic” to get a written confession from a murder.
These are early days, so there’s no word yet on casting or other details for “The Samurai” but O’Connor aims to make this one his next effort behind the camera.