Tommy Lee Jones is in final talks to co-star in Ad Astra, a science-fiction drama being directed and co-written by The Lost City Of Z helmer James Gray.
Jones will star opposite Brad Pitt in a story that Deadline is describing as having “a bit of Heart Of Darkness vibe, set in deep space.”
Pitt would play the slightly autistic space engineer Roy McBride. Twenty years after his father left on a one-way mission to Neptune in order to find signs of extra-terrestrial intelligence, McBride travels through the solar system to find him and understand why his mission failed.
The premise certainly sounds high concept, but one which will be propelled by its characters. That would land it in a similar vein of Interstellar and Gravity, and near future science-fiction films are always welcome, at least by me.
The project got the go-ahead back in February after Paramount pulled the Pitt-starring World War Z sequel off their schedule while that project’s screenplay gets worked on. Pitt had previously produced Gray’s The Lost City Of Z, and at one point was set to star in that film as well.
Earlier this year it looked as if Ad Astra, which is Latin for “to the stars,” was going to get in front of cameras this summer. This last report neither confirms or denies that time table, but if casting is starting to ramp up on the project I would expect that it production will be starting before the year’s end.
