Saying that Keanu Reeves is on a comeback feels disingenuous. Even after ushering the Wachowski siblings' The Matrix trilogy to its conclusion in 2003, Reeves stayed active in almost every release year of the aughts, only taking breaks from the big screen in 2004 and 2007; outside of both years, he starred in movies ranging from Constantine to A Scanner Darkly to Street Kings. Argue about their quality all you like, but you can't knock the guy for standing still.

All the same, Reeves' recent spate of appearances in films like Man of Tai Chi and John Wick (both of which happen to be great) paint a portrait of a man on a tear. He seems energized and determined to leave his cinematic mark in the new decade. Just look at his upcoming slate for proof: he has Eli Roth's Knock Knock, he's circling around the possibility of a Bill and Ted 3, and he's theoretically starring in a TV adaptation of Rain (assuming it goes to series).

That's a heaping helping of projects, and Reeves might add to it by teaming up with Tarsem Singh for The Panopticon. News on this little development comes courtesy of The Wrap; reports indicate that Reeves is at the negotiation stage, so there's no official deal in place as regards his casting. But should Reeves and production company Good Universe come to an agreement, he'll be Singh's leading man.

Last time anybody heard even a peep about The Panopticon was roughly a year ago; the film is about a man who comes into possession of a package containing a pre-recorded message from him, to him, warning that the end of the world is nigh and that only he can stop it. It's some paradoxical stuff, and the synopsis alone doesn't tell us at all what the movie has to do with the Panopticon (a conceptual prison designed by philosopher and social theorist Jeremy Bentham). But Singh deals with mind tripping weirdness in a great deal of his films, so maybe it's best just to leave the details to him.

Singh rose to prominence with 2000's The Cell, but went on a hiatus from making movies before shooting The Fall in 2006. Like Reeves, Singh has been busy of late - neither Immortals nor Mirror Mirror scored highly among critics, but they were box office winners, and it's possible their success has at least something to do with The Panopticon getting green-lit. On paper, though, the idea sounds like something right up Singh's alley, and Reeves - who put his laid back persona to great use in The Matrix - could be the perfectly perplexed hero the film needs.

That still leaves us with little info about its story, and with Singh's next production, Self/Less, on the docket for 2015 it seems likely that we won't be hearing much more about The Panopticon for a while yet. But Reeves hopping aboard could give the movie a serious shot in the arm, as long as he's able to squeeze it in among his myriad other commitments (which also include Tanya Wexler's sci-fi flick Replicas and courtroom drama The Whole Truth).

We'll keep you up to date on The Panopticon as news becomes available.

Source: The Wrap