Gere Flocks To Thriller

It's been a while since we saw Richard Gere in a thriller. In fact, it's been a while since we saw Richard Gere at all, given that hardly anyone went to see Shall We Dance last year, and his film before that was Chicago, which was 21 (dog) years ago! But all that is about to change, as he adds The Flock to his list of Things To Do. The film will also mark the English-language debut of Andrew Lau, best known for Infernal Affairs, the Hong Kong hit about undercover cops 'n' robbers. Unsurprisingly, he's sticking to his thriller roots for this tale, with Gere starring as a federal agent. His character is described as "hypervigilant" (cue clich about overwork and fastidiousness) who is engaged in training his young female replacement while tracking down a missing girl. He's convinced that the girl is connected to a paroled sex offender who he is investigating, so expect lots of sleuthing as he goes. The script has been written by Hans Bauer and Craig Mitchell, who previously wrote Komodo and Highwaymen together. Bauer also worked on Anaconda and its sequel, though, so let's hope that he's got the B-movie bug out of his system by now. The film is aiming for a planned release in autumn 2006, so expect shooting to start early in the New Year. Gere is currently still filming The Hoax in New York, about author Clifford Irving who sold a bogus Howard Hughes biography in the '70s and started a media storm. Clearly, Gere is back in gear.