For a while we were all pretty excited. David Fincher was attached to direct an adaptation of Torso (now being called Ness), Brian Michael Bendis’ excellent comic book about the Cleveland Torso Murders, a serial killer case investigated by none other than Eliot Ness of The Untouchables fame*. Fincher had Matt Damon all but signed to play Ness, and everything looked glorious.

But then it all came to a halt.There’s been very little forward momentum on the project, and in fact Fincher has been talking up another movie, a light comedy called Chef, starring Keanu Reeves. And now Paramount’s option on the material is drawing to an end on December 15th. What now?

Who knows. Could Paramount be gunshy about another Fincher serial killer movie after they dropped the ball on marketing the brilliant Zodiac? Could Fincher be burned out on the genre (he did refer to Zodiac as ‘the last serial killer story’)? Or could the Ehren Kruger script the studio has received be – shocker! – a dog?

Nobody knows the answers. But in ten days we’ll know whether or not this movie becomes fodder for a future Movies That Never Were.

* I imagine there are a couple of people out there right now who didn’t know Ness was a real dude. He was.