Consent to Kill

[GreenScar]

As Matt Damon has casting suggestions for Universal to continue minting Bourne box office without him*, and Paramount looks to reboot the Jack Ryan franchise with Star Trek star Chris Pine, upstart studio CBS Films is considering several actors to launch its own series of spy films. Training Day director Antoine Fuqua is set to direct Consent to Kill, an adaptation of the first of eleven Vince Flynn novels that center on CIA counter-terrorism agent Mitch Rapp. Deadline reports that Gerard Butler, Colin Farrell, and Matthew Fox are on the top of the studio’s wishlist for the starring role. Details after the break:

Gerard Butler is the current front-runner, and it’s easy to see why despite some of his recent questionable turns in the romantic comedy genre. The Scot oozes charisma and seems best equipped to handle the action of the three names, if only because of his shirtless association with 300. Farrell’s star has fallen a bit from his early 2000s heyday, but he wowed CBS Films CEO Amy Baer as the star of S.W.A.T., a project she supervised as a Columbia Pictures executive. Fox has made a name for himself on television on Party of Five in the nineties and Lost in the oughts, but he is fairly untested in feature films. He has been lobbying aggressively for the role though, and may be a good choice if the studio wishes to reign in the budget.

There have been conversations with other actors (notably Keanu Reeves and Jon Hamm), but currently all the attention is on Butler, Farrell, and Fox.

Check out a plot synopsis for the book below. Note that, although Consent to Kill will be the first in the film series, its literary counterpart is the seventh among the novels.

Here’s the plot synopsis for the book:

I would think Matthew Fox would have the lowest fees at this point. Anyone read this novel? Would it make a good book?