Updated 6:05PST – F. Javier Gutierrez (Before The Fall) has been hired to direct. Press release below the jump.

Yesterday I posted an article about the upcoming remake of The Crow.

A press release had stated, “The lawsuit between Relativity Media and The Weinstein Company concerning THE CROW has been amicably settled out of court, and the parties will continue to work on the film together as planned.”

At the end of the article I speculated that since the project didn’t have a writer (or director) that it could still be a long way off. Well, it appears that Relativity and TWC have hit the ground running after settling this legal business because a writer has now been hired – Jesse Wigutow.

Per Deadline, “Jesse Wigutow is making a deal to write the script. The original was distributed by the Weinsteins at Miramax back in 1994 and grossed $50.6M domestic. Wigutow has ‘Irreparable Harm’ set up at HBO Films, just rewrote Robert Ludlum’s ‘The Osterman Weekend’ for Summit, and has ‘Age Inappropriate’ with Offspring at Universal. He recently scripted a Steve McQueen biopic for Cross Creek’s’ Brian Oliver, based on the book Steve McQueen: Portrait of an American Rebel.”

So there’s that! Perhaps this thing gets rolling sooner rather than later, though I’m not really looking forward to it. “Relativity Media’s Co-President, Tucker Tooley, Edward R. Pressman, producer behind the cult-classic The Crow franchise, and The Weinstein Company’s Dimension Films, announced today they have closed a deal with F. Javier Gutiérrez (Before The Fall) to direct a reinvention of The Crow, the 1994 smash hit film based on the comic book series and comic strip by James O’Barr. Writer Jesse Wigutow has signed on to pen the script.”