Deadline reports that Ridley Scott is negotiating a deal to direct The Counselor, a drug thriller based on acclaimed author Cormac McCarthy's first original screenplay. Set in the modern day and said to be in the vein of No County For Old Men, the movie follows a Southwest lawyer who gets involved in shenanigans way over his head in the drug trade and has been described as a very 'masculine' work, occasionally diverting into McCarthy's 'sexual obsession' in his works. Two major roles for female leads will be required, alongside the male lead. McCarthy authored the aforementioned No Country For Old Men and The Road which recently became high-profile movies, the former a Best Picture winning movie. He only turned in the spec script a fortnight ago and has already secured one of the biggest directors working today to jump on board with several studios now said to be interested in financing the low-budget thriller. Not bad Cormac, not bad. Though we have to say before we get too excited, Ridley Scott is one of those A-list helmers would gets himself excited and attaches himself to direct a dozen different films every year. He already has a number of projects peculating as his post-Prometheus projects including a Blade Runner follow-up, a Gertrude Bell biopic with Angelina Jolie eyeing the leading role, a Reagan/Gorbachev Cold War summit drama Reykjavik, and let's not forget the long-gestating Monopoly movie and Gucci biopic. So we can't guarantee this will be the next one to go. Scott will also produce The Counselor at Scott Free and let's hope that if he doesn't get around to directing the project next, he does the right thing and appoints another director to helm the film so McCarthy's screenplay doesn't end up on the shelf for years.