John Scalzi’s Old Man’s War Helmed by Wolfgang Petersen?

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Wolfgang Peterson is taking old men to war, according to Deadline. Paramount has gotten their hands on the screen rights to the John Scalzi sci-fi novel series, Old Man’s War. David Self will be adapting the story for the project that Peterson is directing, as well as co-producing with Scott Stuber.

The story synopsis according to the back of the book is:

John Perry did two things on his 75th birthday. First he visited his wife’s grave. Then he joined the army.

The good news is that humanity finally made it into interstellar space. The bad news is that planets fit to live on are scarce-and aliens willing to fight for them are common. The universe, it turns out, is a hostile place.

So: we fight. To defend Earth (a target for our new enemies, should we let them get close enough) and to stake our own claim to planetary real estate. Far from Earth, the war has gone on for decades: brutal, bloody, unyielding.

Earth itself is a backwater. The bulk of humanity’s resources are in the hands of the Colonial Defense Force, which shields the home planet from too much knowledge of the situation. What’s known to everybody is that when you reach retirement age, you can join the CDF. They don’t want young people; they want people who carry the knowledge and skills of decades of living. You’ll be taken off Earth and never allowed to return. You’ll serve your time at the front. And if you survive, you’ll be given a generous homestead stake of your own, on one of our hard-won colony planets.

John Perry is taking that deal. He has only the vaguest idea what to expect. Because the actual fight, light-years from home, is far, far harder than he can imagine-and what he will become is far stranger.

Old Man’s War is the first title in a four-book series so it’s safe to say a sequel will be coming along if this one is any good.