Nicolas Cage to play Osama bin Laden hunter in comedy Army of One

http://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/jan/22/nicolas-cage-osama-bin-laden-hunter-army-of-one

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Nicolas Cage will play an ordinary American who sets out to hunt down Osama Bin Laden in director Larry Charles’s satirical comedy Army of One, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

Based loosely on the story of Gary Faulkner, a Colorado construction worker with health problems who tried to make his way into Pakistan and Afghanistan on several occasions in search of the al-Qaida leader, the film will be Charles’s followup to Sacha Baron Cohen comedies Borat, Bruno and The Dictator.

The former staff writer for long-running TV sitcom Seinfeld has signed a deal with Hollywood superproducers Bob and Harvey Weinstein to release the movie under their new TWC-Dimension banner. Charles is due to shoot in March from a screenplay by Draft Day’s Scott Rothman and Rajiv Joseph, for a proposed release in cinemas by the end of the year.

Faulkner’s story was detailed in a 2010 GQ magazine article by journalist Chris Heath which told of his missions to Pakistan armed with a sword he’d bought on a home-shopping network, a pistol and a pair of night-vision goggles. The ponytailed eccentric, nicknamed the “Rocky Mountain Rambo”, also appeared on the David Letterman talk show that same year to discuss his determination to pursue the terrorist leader and belief that he had been chosen by God for the mission.

“What this is about is the American people and the world,” Faulkner told reporters at a US airport upon his return from an 11th mission to Pakistan. “We can’t let people like this scare us. We don’t get scared by people like this. We scare them. And that’s what this is about.”

The project looks a perfect fit for Charles, who is not involved in the controversial new Baron Cohen comedy Grimsby. The tale of a spy who goes on the run with his eccentric football hooligan brother is instead being directed by French film-maker and Luc Besson protege Louis Leterrier.