New Jack City. Posse. Baadassss! Marion Van Peebles has directed some great genre films but has never really achieved the notoriety he probably deserves. Lately he's been working in TV and straight-to-DVD action flicks, but now he's looking at a high-profile gig directing Nicolas Cage in the military thriller, USS Indianapolis: Men of Courage.
While it's tough to get excited over anything Cage does nowadays because most of it is crap, maybe van Peebles can bring something new out of him. The film is penned by Cam Cannon and is based on the true events surrounding the 1945 torpedoing of the titular ship by Japanese submarines soon after delivering parts for the first atomic bomb. Cage will play "Capt. Charles Butler McVay, whose ship was torpedoed in the South Pacific in July 1945, after delivering parts for the first atomic bombs. Of 1,196 crewmen aboard, approximately 300 went down with the ship, while the rest faced exposure, dehydration, saltwater poisoning, and shark attacks as they waited for assistance. Only 317 sailors survived and McVay was court-martialed, then exonerated more than half a century later."
This definitely sounds like the biggest film Van Peebles has done in some time, so hopefully it won't get overshadowed by a similar project being shepherded by Robert Downey Jr. for Tate Taylor (Get On Up) to direct.
