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It's feeling a little bit like a Vin Diesel kind of afternoon: The action star/marble-mouthed part-time nanny is starting to get the idea that his vision for his pet project, Hannibal the Conqueror, might never be realized.

"I got a budget back from a studio that said it would cost $217 million. So I said, 'I know I'm not the smartest guy in the world but $217 million, doesn't that mean that this film will never get made?'

The studio exec who delivered the budget number to Diesel sighed, patted him gently on the back, and said, "Yes, Vin, that means this film probably won't get made. But we were afraid that if we listed the budget as 'eleventy billion dollars,' you might not get the message. And, by the way, we don't actually need a time machine to shoot it."