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Disney has been making lots of news lately! Not only did they buy out Lucasfilm and have signed on Michael Arndt (‘Toy Story 3,’ ‘Little Miss Sunshine,’ ‘The Hunger Games: Catching Fire’) to write ‘Star Wars VII,’ now Variety is reporting that they are in negotiations with George Clooney to star in their new super-secret project ‘1952.’

Back in May we reported that director Brad Bird (‘Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol’) would be helming ‘1952,’ a project that was written by genre fave Damon Lindelof (‘Lost,’ ‘Prometheus,’ ‘Star Trek into Darkness’). The title was said to be inspired by a visit last spring by Lindelof, who is also producing the film, to the Imagineering section of the studio. He saw a box that was labeled ‘That Darn Cat!” (from the title from the 1965 Disney movie comedy) which was crossed off and re-labeled ‘1952.’ Inside the box was a collection of documents and source materials indicating that someone was working on a project that dealt with alien contact.

Whether this is actually the inspiration of the plot is unknown but it has been said that ‘1952’ will be in the same vein as Steven Spielberg’s 1977 ‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind’ and will center around a man in his late forties, similar to Richard Dreyfuss’ character, Roy Neary, who is searching for extra-terrestrials.

The film is slated to begin production sometime next year but it probably won’t occur until after March, as Clooney (if he does sign on), will be busy with his next film “Monuments Men,” a heist thriller that he’ll write, direct and star in.

To give you an indication of how super-secret ‘1952’ is, Variety is reporting that Disney has no comment and their sources are saying that the project is not officially greenlit nor has a cast been yet set. I guess just like evidence that extra-terrestrials exists, we’ll see if this movie will exist as more proof comes out.