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Travolta & Cage Maybe Facing Off Again in 'Shrapnel' and 'Sea Trial'

by Ethan Anderton
March 25, 2011
Source: Vulture

It's been about 14 years since the 1997 action romp Face/Off, but now Nicolas Cage and John Travolta could be going head-to-head again in not one, but different independent thrillers. Vulture has the news on the promising reunion with one project that we heard about late last year, and another that's just now coming to the surface. The first would be Shrapnel, a script from Evan Dougherty that appeared on the 2008 Black List and just had Die Hard director John McTiernan attached to direct last September. But, the filmmaker has since found himself sentenced to a year in prison, so he may not even be involved anymore.

Shrapnel follows a former Bosnian soldier who seeks vengeance against the American who badly wounded him by disguising a deadly war game as a friendly backwoods hunting trip. Yeah, that sounds like exactly that kind of movie I want Travolta and Cage to come back together for soon. It'd be like having Larry Bird and Michael Jordan squaring off again or something. As for McTiernan's involvement, he's currently appealing his sentence and is free on bail, so maybe he'll end up directing after all. We'll find out.

The second project is an adaptation of Frank De Felitta's novel Sea Trial and would see Cage and Travolta working with The Dark Knight producer Charles Roven. The author's son Raymond De Felitta (writer and director of City Island) would be at the helm of the adaptation, but it's still lining up funding. Here's the official synopsis:

Tracey and Phil are lovers. They have planned a romantic cruise as the perfect ending to a perfect affair. But the Penny Dreadful, the yacht on which they have chosen to sail, was never intended for pleasure. Nor are Catain and Mrs McCracken the pleasant, middle-aged couple they seem.

Soon the accidents begin: a series of accidents. And then the chores and deprivations in an ever-tihtening chain of punishments and hardships. It is as though they have embareked on a passage through fire, a cruise through hell.

Tracey Hansen and Philip Sobel are about to be initiated into the rites and ways of evil.

It's not exactly switching faces and shooting guns at each other, but it is another opportunity for Cage and Travolta to face-off yet again. Obviously the two actor are anxious to work with each other again if both of these projects are in their sights, but I'm wondering if only one will end up getting off the ground. Shrapnel seems a little more generic, but has more opportunity for some fun action, but producer Charles Roven really knows how to line-up talent in front of and behind the camera so Sea Trial could easily be just as entertaining. What do you think?

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