Sony misses the 3:10 to Yuma

Sony has apparently let 3:10 to Yuma pass by. A remake of the 1957 Glenn Ford western, Yuma was all set to go with Jim Mangold (Walk the Line) directing a screenplay by Stuart Beattie (Collateral), and Tom Cruise attached as one of the leads, when the embattled star abruptly jumped off the picture last week. Russell Crowe, who had recently abandoned Baz Luhrman’s Outback extravaganza and who had been pursuing Yuma for a year, immediately jumped on board. But he was just as quickly back in limbo when the studio suddenly got cold feet.

The film’s fate is now up in the air, and there are whispers that Sony has been shopping it to other studios–are they looking for a financing partner or a foster home? With Fox dumping the Jim Carrey futuristic comedy Used Guys for budget reasons and all kinds of other high-priced studio films being put up on blocks, we’re starting to smell the faint whiff of something strange and unfamiliar wafting up from the Dream Factory.

Smells like. . . sanity.

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