Sony Eyes James Cameron to Direct CLEOPATRA with Angelina Jolie

Sony Entertainment is fast tracking the project, Cleopatra, due to a "brilliant script deserving of epic treatment" turned in by Brian Helgeland. They also are hoping to land James Cameron to direct before he gets too far involved with the Avatar sequels.

The planned 3D film is set for a PG-13 rating and is an adaptation of the Stacy Schiff book Cleopatra: A Life. Jolie has been attached for some time and is anxious to make the movie. Scott Rudin is producing.

The movie is said to have a very large scale budget and Jolie is interested in having Brad Pitt to star as Mark Antony. All of these points are eerily similar to the 1963 version starring Elizabeth Taylor and her then lover, Richard Burton, which almost collapsed 20th Century Fox due to massive over budgeting.

According to Deadline, at this point the talks with Cameron are "serious but by no means conclusive yet." The director has worked almost exclusively with FOX and has obviously shown that he can handle a big budget with the likes of Avatar and Titanic. The studio is hoping for a 2011 start date on filming.

The story will show a much truer side to Cleopatra than the 1963 version starring Elizabeth Taylor. Book writer Stacy Schiff has discovered rare and astonishing facts that show an entirely different side to the Queen. About the project, Angelina Jolie stated:

"I will play it differently to Elizabeth Taylor, but I could never be as lovely as she was. We are trying to uncover the truth about her as a leader and not just a sex symbol which she really wasn't -- she didn't have many lovers, maybe only two, and they're men she had children with. She was misunderstood and her life story was written wrongly. I always thought her life was very glamorous. Then I read her story and found a different side to her - that she was a mother, leader and an intellect who spoke five languages! Her upbringing also reflected her relationship with Rome -- all that is much more interesting than what she was summed up to be."