If you’re going to remake Truffaut, you might as well do the job on a lesser-known effort. Such a mentality makes this news a bit easier to work out, as Shadow&Act has learned that Common (Terminator Salvation, Hell on Wheels) will star in an update of the director’s 1977 outing, The Man Who Loved Women. (This is a film that was first remade in 1983, with Blake Edwards directing — if you can believe this pairing — Burt Reynolds and Julie Andrews. People have indicated it’s not very good.) Director J. Kevin Swain — whose prior work consists of music videos and, on a related note, music-related television documentaries — will make his debut on the film.

Truffaut‘s film centered on Bertrand Morane, a French man who, in writing his autobiography, details the various romantic conquests he’s managed to accrue throughout the years; in this outing, Common will be seen as Buenos Aires resident Marc Guiness. He’s not all, though. With this premise creating room for a pretty wide-reaching cast of female characters, there’s a bit of credence to the rumor that Swain is attempting to corral Kerry Washington, Taraji P. Henson, Freida Pinto, Eva Marcille, and Alicia Keys to play the women in his life. If he can actually get them on board is, obviously, a whole different story.

But I’d say it’s off to a good start — Common, from what I’ve seen, has a much more positive screen presence than a vast majority of musicians-turned-actors — and classy source material is bound to attract at least a few other big names.

Have you seen Truffaut’s original, and does it warrant a (second) remake? Is this the right way to go about doing so?