Osama Bin Laden Movie in the Works?

Oct. 3 -- An eerily prescient 1999 book in which Osama bin Laden orders an attack on the White House is being made into a film by Miramax — once some of the too-true-to-life details are changed, the studio says.

Hollywood has been quick to shelve movie projects like Collateral Damage and Jackie Chan's unfilmed action-comedy Nosebleed, which also bore frightening similarities to the events of Sept. 11.

However, Miramax is proceeding, albeit cautiously, with the project, which is based on the book Crisis Four, written by Andy McNab, who is a former member of the SAS, Britain's elite army security regiment.

The studio optioned it in July of this year, well before the horrific terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon; the White House was believed to be a terrorist target as well.

Bin Laden, White House Plot Elements Will Be Dropped

"In light of this tragedy, we are reviewing the material," Miramax spokesman Matthew Hiltzik tells us. "There will be no plotline involving Osama bin Laden or a plot to blow up the White House," he insisted. When asked whether the film would still have terrorist elements, Hiltzik said it was "premature," to talk about the details of a revised plot. According to Reuters, a screenwriter has been assigned to adapt the project, but no production date has been set.

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Another scarily similar plot on CBS's new inside-the-CIA drama, The Agency, in which bin Laden orchestrates a biochemical attack on the United States, was also scrapped in favor of an episode involving a plot to assassinate Fidel Castro.

'Not Jumping on the Bandwagon,' Says Author

Crisis Four is the story of a British woman, the "beautiful, steel-willed, intelligent, and cunning" Sarah Greenwood, who is recruited by bin Laden, America's prime suspect in the real-life attacks, to infiltrate the White House. The book's hero is Nick Stone, a former SAS soldier and admittedly autobiographical figure, who must find her.

"I am not jumping on the bandwagon. This is not taking advantage of anything," author McNab insisted. Of his first reaction on hearing of the real-life attacks, he said, "I didn't believe what I was seeing … It is stranger than fiction."