Sam Worthington to Bring Back Allan Quartermain

I look at Sam Worthington as something of a cipher. A lucky cipher, but one nonetheless. His movies make tons of money: Avatar, Terminator Salvation, Clash of the Titans...for whatever reason the guy has zeroed in on the big money franchises. Those movies don't really belong to him, though.  He's an important cog in their success, but when I think Avatar I think James Cameron and the effects first. Terminator has a long history of actors and ideas that come way before I think of Worthington's bit, and Titans just plain stunk so I think about how wretched it was first.  He's a blank slate as an actor.

Perhaps in a bid to define himself in a role completely his own, Worthington is now set to star and produce a big budget futuristic take on Allan Quartermain. The project is being housed at Dreamworks, and will feature Worthington as the big game hunter turned adventurer, loosely based on the novels of H. Rider Haggard.

Hmm..what was the last time we saw Allan Quartermain in a film? Oh yeah! The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen! That's right! The movie that effectively ended Sean Connery's career and made fans of the awesome graphic novels wanna pour hot coffee on our genitals. Before that, there were the 1980s Richard Chamberlain flicks, which weren't bad but lacked the fun of the Indiana Jones movies they were trying so hard to copy.

I like the idea of Worthington headlining a project that should give him a chance to really be the lead dog, but why set it in the future? Is it as a means of separating itself from the revived Indiana Jones franchise? I don't know, but I'll remain cautiously optimistic about it. As long as we don't see a Shane West version of Tom Sawyer anywhere near this, it might just work out.

You can read more of THR's coverage of the story here.