Christian Bale's knee injury could completely derail The Deep Blue Goodbye, the film adaptation of John D. MacDonald's classic series of mystery-adventure books.
Bale was set to play Travis McGee, a former soldier/ladies man/"salvage consultant" who lives on a house boat and gets mixed up in adventurous mystery adventures with bad guys and whatnot, but he tore his ACL and won't be able to handle the physically demanding role.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the project could be dead, but is more likely postponed indefinitely. With Bale's busy schedule, its unlikely he'd be able to film the movie for a long time. The studio wasn't able to find a replacement for Bale quickly enough to keep the movie on schedule (Brad Pitt apparently was approached but not available).
No word on how Bale tore his ACL, but it reportedly happened right before he started filming The Big Short, which is a movie that also stars Pitt and Ryan Gosling and tries to make the housing bubble exciting. Apparently a movie about finance isn't too physically demanding for a guy with a torn ACL.
