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Vin Diesel to Make Triumphant Return to XXX Franchise

XXX^3: Columbia is in talks with producer Joe Roth to make XXX: The Return of Xander Cage, a sequel that would reteam Vin Diesel and director Rob Cohen, both of whom have agreed to return. We can only imagine the phone call to the trilogy-happy Diesel. Studio head: “Let’s making another XXX.” Diesel: “Everyone knows I only make trilogies.” Studio head: “Technically that crapbucket sequel with Ice Cube was a XXX movie, so that, technically, makes this a trilogy.” Diesel: “I’M IN!” [Coming Soon]

Ozzy Bites Head Off Feature: According to Jack Osbourne, his father Ozzy “refuses to do a book, because he’s terribly dyslexic, can’t write and doesn’t want a ghostwriter,” so the burden of producing a documentary on the Black Sabbath front man’s life falls on him. [Variety]

FARC You: As we’d hoped, July’s Colombian hostage situation is getting the big-screen treatment, as Screen Gems has tapped Jessica Postigo to write Operation Checkmate, a story told from the perspective of the military rescuers who duped FARC and freed the fifteen hostages, including former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt. Producers plan to “have the final 22 minutes of the rescue unfold in real time,” presumably with a beeping clock before every commercial break. [Variety]

Three New Cowboys: The O.C.’s Cam Gigandet, ER’s Shane West, and Rachel Leigh Cook are in negotiations to join Kerosene Cowboys, a Mario Van Peebles action thriller from Svarog-Afterburner Films. Familiar-sounding story follows “the rough-riding and hard-living pilots of an elite Navy attack squadron,” and while the plot details are kind of vague, we can tell you that the Cruise-Kilmer volleyball scene is going to be sexxxxxxy! [Kruger With a Bullet: Ehren Kruger, writer of Transformers 2, will adapt Boston Teran’s God Is a Bullet and produce it himself, much like he did with Jennifer Egan’s The Keep last year when he set it up with Rogue Pictures. Teran’s novel follows a California lawman forced undercover to rescue his daughter from a gang of criminals. Unfortunately for moviegoers, he goes undercover as neither a kindergarten teacher nor a brother. [Variety]

Vin Diesel to Make Triumphant Return to XXX Franchise