The Fighter has been in development for years now, but it could finally be ready to start filming.

With Mark Wahlberg, Christian Bale and David O. Russell onboard, filming may not be too far away. Dare we hope?

The Fighter has experienced a fair few problems during pre-production. Mark Wahlberg and Matt Damon were to star together in it, then Matt Damon left. Then Brad Pitt was to co-star, and he backed out too. Then the director Darren Aronofsky moved on as well. Late last year, Mark Wahlberg sounded more than a little fed up. Not a surprise considering he has been training for the film for around two years.

Thankfully we then got some good news, Christian Bale was to join as co-star and David O. Russell was going to direct. Other than that though, production still hasn't been mentioned. Christian Bale has been talking about the film though, and first up he gave a rough plot outline:

It's a true story of two incredibly gifted boxers who were half brothers. The one, Dicky Ecklund, who fought Sugar Ray Leonard at a very young age, when he was twenty one, was an incredible natural talent. He lived a very hard life. Then he came to train his brother, Irish Mickey Ward, to the world title.

Christian Bale is playing the part of Dickey, with Wahlberg playing Irish Mickey Ward. Bale though says that production may start soon:

We might start within a couple of weeks.

Could we at last be seeing The Fighter committing something to film? Let's hope so, it's certainly been dragging on for long enough. I hope his Batman voice takes a break though. You can head on over to Collider for more of the interview, where be basically says he isn't sure what's happening with Terminator 5 or Batman 3.

I'm quite looking forward to seeing Bale and Wahlberg together. Anyone else still interested in The Fighter? Or has the long delay put you off?