Rising writer-director Ric Roman Waugh has had an unconventional path to the director's chair. For more than a decade, he was a stuntman in films like Tango & Cash and Total Recall, but in 1996, he broke into work behind-the-scenes, snagging a job as a second unit director on a TV movie. Since then he's written and directed a string of little known crime movies like In the Shadows, Felon, and Snitch, a Dwayne Johnson vehicle that's set to debut in in 2013.
While his latest feature has had some struggles in securing a release date, it seems Snitch is solid enough to secure Waugh new work, as Relativity has just snagged him for Tipping Point. THR reports Waugh has signed on to direct the sci-fi thriller. He is also being asked to rewrite the original screenplay penned by Todd Stein. The story is set 100 years from now in a dystopian future where the world's population has skyrocketed to nearly 10 billion people. Overpopulation is causing a wide array of problems worldwide, and so reproduction is only allowed with a license. If anyone dares to have a child without obtaining a license, the penalty is death for both parents and child.
The center of this tale is Population Control Officer Solomon Cage, who is dedicated to his duty as hunter and executioner. But his faith in his vocation is shaken when he discovers that the two latest fugitives he's been assigned to track down are the long-lost love of his life who mysteriously vanished nearly 13 years ago, and the 12-year-old son Cage never knew he had. There's no word on casting yet, but with the name Solomon Cage, this seems guaranteed to have Nic Cage on the shortlist, right?
In the meantime, keep an eye out for Snitch, which stars Johnson as a dedicated dad forced to go undercover with the DEA to get his son out of a lengthy prison sentence. The thriller based on a true story will hit theaters on February 22nd, 2013.
