You can never go wrong making a movie about counterfeiters or gangsters. They could make a hundred of these movies a year and studios would still make money. The reason is simple: people love to watch others reap financial rewards through illegitimate means as long as the criminals don't take the money directly from average, good-hearted Americans.

Making the latest entry in the popular counterfeiter/gangster subgenre, Chris Pine (Captain Kirk) and director D.J. Caruso ("Eagle Eye", "Disturbia") are in negotiations with Paramount Pictures to make "The Art of Making Money" next year. The movie would be based on a 2005 Rolling Stone article by Jason Kersten, who turned his reporting into the book "The Art of Making Money: The Story of a Master Counterfeiter". More after the jump:

While I love movies that take place in the criminal underworld, another reason to get excited for this project is the script by Frank Baldwin. While some movies are put together at the last minute and the script is almost an afterthought, Baldwin's script was on The Black List in 2007. For those that don't know, The Black List is comprised of the best unproduced scripts that agents and assistants read that year. If you're on the list, you wrote something that a lot of people liked. Alumni from 2007's list include "The Road", "The Wrestler" and "Zombieland".

But the big question mark about this project is what this means for D.J. Caruso's other projects. Since "Eagle Eye", Caruso was on "Y: The Last Man", "The Defenders", and the feature adaptation of the video game "Dead Space". If he jumps into this project, what does that means for the others? As I've mentioned before, directors attach themselves to multiple projects so they have options, because getting financing, a big star and an awesome script at the same time is not easy.

Of course, Chris Pine's has the "Star Trek" sequel on his schedule which is definitely filming next year. But with Paramount producing this project and "Trek", I'm pretty sure they can work out a way for him to do both. According to the Variety story, "Pine will play Art Williams, the alias for a Chicago man who rose from petty theft to become a master counterfeiter." Sounds like Pine is going to have a lot of fun in 2010. Captain Kirk and a counterfeiter. Not bad. More as we get it.