Hey folks, Harry here with a fairly passionate reporting of the news about CASCA based on the Biblical Roman Soldier that pulled the wrong detail on the wrong day and pays for it throughout eterntiy. I believe he was a character in THE SEVENTH SIGN or whatever that Demi Moore film was called. Anyway, here's SPYder with his lamentations and further information about the story and what it was based upon...
Hey Harry,
SPYder, here. I found a copy of the daily Variety, Cannes edition, here in my web this morning when I awoke. I'm sure you'll see it in your copies in the States, too.
There is a sidebar article about how Radar Pictures (read "Michael Bay") and Universal Focus (the new Universal specialty arm forged from the merger of Good Machine, USA Films, and GMI) have acquired the rights to the "Casca" series by Barry Sadler. John Turman ("Iron Fist," "Silver Surfer") is attached to write the screenplay, which takes place in the present day.
I was crushed to read this. It was the movie project I'd been hoping to make since high school.
For those who don't know, the "Casca" series depicts the journeys of Casca Rufio Longinus (Variety spelled it wrong -- "Longiness"), the Roman soldier who struck the final blow with a spear to Christ's side and was condemned to wander the Earth as an eternal soldier until the second coming. The books were written by Barry Sadler, who also wrote "Ballad of the Green Berets," and who met an untimely end in a very enigmatic gunshot in a taxi-cab incident in Central America. Sadler was a soldier and mercenary himself, whose image was used to generate the protrait of Casca that appeared on the cover of every book. There's a great story that Sadler told of a time he was boarding an airplane to find the man in the seat next to him reading the first Casca book. According to Sadler, the fellow went from the cover of the book, to Sadler, and back again. The fellow asked Sadler if he'd ever done any soldiering. Sadler, never one to miss a moment, gave the fellow a slight grin and said, "A little."
Now, personally, I always thought it was odd that Jesus of all people would have cursed the Roman soldier just doing the job that Christ knew he was going to do, but the books themselves were a mainstay of my high school senior year. A couple friends of mine turned me on to the series, and I read all of them. I thought there were only 21, but Variety mentions that all 22 books have been optioned as material for possible use in the movie.
Each book has Casca as a solider in a different era and a different conflict. He was a Panzer soldier, who switches sides and ultimately meets Hitler in the final moments; he was a soldier in the Vietnam war, a Norse king turned Incan god (a very cool sequence there), a pirate, a soldier in the Civil War, etc. Any major military conflict in the last two thousand years, and our former Legionaire was there, pursued by the Brotherhood of the Lamb; followers of the lost thirteenth disciple who witnessed the cursing of Casca and charged his followers to trail Casca until the Second Coming. Wherever Casca was, that was where the Second Coming would be, but the Brotherhood of the Lamb was also charged with making Casca's life a living hell while they all wait for Christ to return. There's a scar around his right wrist that has quite a story behind it, the handiwork of the Brotherhood of the Lamb.
My biggest fear is that this picture will suck. I always wanted to take the material from the first three books and make an introductory screenplay that would hopefully be the foundation for a couple sequels. There's a lot of good material there, and with the right actor in the lead, Casca could be a kick-ass franchise. I have to confess, I always hoped Mel Gibson would be Casca, at least he was at the top of my short list of actors for the role. I doubt they can get him, but it would be a way cool part if they could. Russell Crowe would be an intersting second, but I doubt you'll get him back in lorica or Rome again anytime soon.
-- SPYder, out.
