The 1983 film WarGames is well-suited for an update---the vast advancement in video game technology in the past three decades opens the door for a fresh take on the material.  According to Heat Vision, MGM has hired Noah Oppenheim for the task.  The up-and-coming screenwriter does not yet have a produced credit, but he has several projects in development.  There's the Snabba Cash remake, a Jackie Kennedy biopic produced by Steven Spielberg, an adaptation of The Maze Runner, and the wonderfully titled The Secret Life of Houdini.  I'll wait to see one of these movies before I praise him too much, but there's something to be said for a screenwriter who convinces so many employers of his greatness.  Plus, it is appropriate that a man named Oppenheim will write the movie about a boy who nearly starts a nuclear war when he thinks he's playing a video game.Seth Gordon (Horrible Bosses) will direct WarGames for MGM.  Read about his approach to the remake after the jump.While promoting Horrible Bosses, Gordon told us:

I love the original. I’m a bit of a hacker fanatic, and know a fair bit about that industry and cyber crime and cyber warfare. I have a real point-of-view on the material and how things have changed. And also, I think the politics of the world have changed in really fascinating ways since 1983. There’s no longer a monolithic evil empire somewhere, spreading a different philosophy of life. That doesn’t exist. It’s a much more complicated, nuanced, political world we’re in, and I think that actually makes for a more interesting plot to tell. Frankly, cyber attack is a lot more real.

I'm not convinced Gordon is a great director, but this is essentially what I want to hear from the man remaking WarGames.  Hopefully the video game connection will inspire Gordon in the way The King of Kong (his best film) did.

A note on the title: the original was WarGames, no space.  Reports on the remake go back and forth---Heat Vision calls it War Games, space included.  Where do I cast my vote for the space?