Tom Cruise Drops Out Of MAGNIFICENT SEVEN Remake

Tom Cruise has dropped out of MGM’s planned Magnificent Seven remake. The actor had been attached to the project in May 2012, but has now left for undisclosed reasons, according to The Wrap.

But as Cruise is heading out the door, coming in is Saving Mr. Banks director John Lee Hancock to do a rewrite on the screenplay. In addition to scripting the western The Alamo for Disney, he recently stepped in to do some work overhauling the screenplay to the studio’s live action, Sleeping Beauty-inspired film Maleficent. The first drafts of the Magnificent Seven remake were from Nic Pizzolatto, creator of HBO’s True Detective series.

This Magnificent Seven remake is just one of many that the studio has initiated that raids their vaults for classic films to remake.

The original Magnificent Seven premiered in 1960 and starred Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, James Coburn, Robert Vaughn, Brad Dexter and Horst Buchholz as a group of American outlaws hired to protect a small, poor Mexican village from a band of bandits lead by Eli Wallach. It was, in turn, a retelling of Akira Kurosawa’s 1954 classic Seven Samurai, just replanting the basic story from feudal Japan to the Old West.

Other remakes that MGM is currently developing include WarGames, Poltergeist and Death Wish. The first film from their remake program, RoboCop, hits theaters in February.