Full Cast for Steven Soderbergh's Knockout

When Steven Soderbergh announced that he would direct a spy/action film starring MMA fighter Gina Carano written by his The Limey screenwriter Lem Dobbs, the reaction was positive. Now that the name supporting cast is being revealed, I'm curious to hear what people have to say. Personally, each news item has elevated my interest. There are also some new details on the script, as the original idea for the film has been reworked slightly, though it is still very much in the action/thriller vein.

Movieline broke the first casting news today, that 'Inglourious Basterds' Michael Fassbender would be seen in the film. 'I'll be starting work with Steven Soderbergh in the beginning of February in Dublin,' he told the site.

That scoop prompted The Playlist to chime in with additional casting news: also in the mix are Ewan McGregor, Michael Douglas and Dennis Quaid. (Hey, two news stories for Quaid today!) That makes for a hell of a lineup. Fassbender is turning into a real man of the moment based on his work in Hunger and Basterds, and Douglas has already had a good working relationship with Soderbergh in Traffic. It's easy to be down on McGregor of late, but I'll bet that Soderbergh can get good work from him.

Originally, the film was pitched as a sort of La Femme Nikita tale — Carano would have played a woman with a bad history who is redeemed by her covert work. Variety's logline was 'a girl from the wrong side of the tracks is given a second chance to use her skills for constructive purposes." Now, as The Playlist has it, the story goes like this:

Double crossed by someone on her own team, Mallory Kane (Carano)— a black ops super soldier — seeks to uncover who has set her up to take the fall for a job that goes bad that involves a murder.

Expect to see Douglas as a government authority figure, McGregor as the head of a Blackwater-like PMC, and Quaid, Fassbender and one other big actor yet to be announced as other commando types, one of whom does the betraying. (Edited to add: THR's Heat Vision blog has a piece confirming and expanding The Playlist's info. I'd call the trade's character breakdowns a bit more spoilery, but check out the article if you want to know more.)

The plot is still extremely routine, and given the fact that Soderbergh has namedropped Point Blank when talking about this in the past, not a huge surprise. But I'll take this group making a revenge thriller. Any day.