The Kidd here...
This doesn't appear to be happening anytime soon, but Tom Cruise is now attached to a remake of THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN for MGM, who is quickly turning into a remake factory after settling their financial problems. According to Variety, there's no director or writer set up just yet, which means only the idea for remaking John Sturges' classic exists for now... and who knows when something might come together... but it is in the pipeline.
Cruise is involved with a lot of projects right now that there's no telling where THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN falls in the pecking order. He's got the Jack Reacher series, another MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE at some point, VAN HELSING, the Les Grossman flick, the TOP GUN sequel and ALL YOU NEED IS KILL, not to mention OBLIVION which he's currently shooting. That's a lot of films, some of which will continue on without Cruise... but will one of them be THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN? At some point THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN will get redone... it's just a matter of whether it'll involve Cruise or not. So would you rather it be in his hands or someone else's?
Let's remember that THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN is in and of itself a remake of Kurosawa's SEVEN SAMURAI, so it's hard to rail on this being another remake... but it is a classic, and that's a little bit harder pill to swallow.
Could a retelling of THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN work with an updated cast, sort of how OCEAN'S ELEVEN worked (different format, same idea)? Sure. It's just a matter of if Cruise is the right guy to front it.
-Billy Donnelly
"The Infamous Billy The Kidd"
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