Kurt Russell To Go Noir Route In Undying

Kurt Russell is a wonder. Though he's no longer the star he was when Escape From New York and The Thing first came out, he regularly does about one movie every year. Despite the occasional cash-grab movie (Poseidon anyone?), he seems to pick his roles carefully, and now it looks like he's ready to do a supernatural noir.

THR reports that Russell has been cast in Undying based on a script by Book of Eli writer Gary Whitta. The film appears to be a take on the standard noir storyline where a private investigator is hired by a mysterious femme fatale, the twist being that Russell's private eye, named Virgil Lone, is brought to the underworld to do the job.

It's hard to argue against a well-made noir when it is done right, but the genre has been brought back unsuccessfully so many times that it's almost hard to get excited about it anymore - for every Kiss Kiss Bang Bang you get a Black Dahlia. When the genre first came around during the 1940s, America was enmeshed in World War II and the films reflected the darker side of the conflict. Perhaps, with the country still in a recession, this truly is the time to bring it back.