George Clooney To Star In Men Who Stare At Goats

If you're a moviegoer who doesn't generally dislike George Clooney but reacts to movie news about him like an allergic reaction to salt-and-peppered dander, you'll want to make an exception here. The actor is set to star in an adaptation of Jon Ronson's book, Men Who Stare at Goats, a wily nonfiction account of the U.S. army's history of dabbling in the supernatural that leads up to the current quagmire in Iraq. Here's a synopsis from Amazon...

"As Ronson reveals, a secret wing of the U.S. military called First Earth Battalion was created in 1979 with the purpose of creating "Warrior Monks," soldiers capable of walking through walls, becoming invisible, reading minds and even killing a goat simply by staring at it. ...But Ronson soon learns that the Battalion's bizarre ideas inspired some alarming torture techniques being used in the present-day War on Terror. One technique involves subjecting prisoners to 24 hours of Barney the Purple Dinosaur's song, "I Love You," and another makes use of the Predator, a small, toy-like object designed by military martial arts master Pete Brusso that can inflict a large amount of pain in many different ways..."

Cool subject matter almost lending itself to a Coens-esque romp, no? The film will be directed by multitasker Grant Heslov, a partner in Clooney's Smoke House imprint, with a script by Peter Straughan (the upcoming adaptation of Toby Young's How to Win Friends and Alienate People). After the prototypically classy Michael Clayton and Leatherheads, it's time Clooney put on a nappy wig and went a little batshit like Nic Cage in Raising Arizona or Tom Hanks in Cast Away. Between this project, foregoing too much current event storyline, and September's dark and quirky Burn After Reading, it would seem he's headed on a similarly looney, and successful, trajectory.

via Variety (oh yeah, and shame, shame)