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Spielberg, Cruise set for 'War'

LOS ANGELES, Aug. 12 (UPI) -- The Steven Spielberg-Tom Cruise collaboration on "War of the Worlds" has been put on an accelerated pre-production schedule, Daily Variety said Thursday.

The paper said the decision followed two days of intense negotiations that also resulted in two major projects being put on hold temporarily.

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Spielberg's untitled Universal-DreamWorks project about the aftermath of the terrorist attack at the 1972 Munich Olympics has been put on hold until at least next June. Cruise's third "Mission: Impossible" project at Paramount has been postponed until next summer.

Variety said "War of the Worlds" -- adapted by screenwriter David Koepp from the H.G. Wells novel -- will begin filming in November, after just 10 weeks of pre-production. The paper said that was an unusually short amount of lead time for a complex computer-generated effects movie.

DreamWorks and Paramount are co-financing "War of the Worlds." Variety said Spielberg and Cruise will not receive fees for the project -- holding down the cost of production -- but both will receive a substantial percentage of the gross.

"War of the Worlds" is tentatively scheduled for a 2005 release.

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