Robert Rodriguez will be directing a remake of the John Carpenter classic Escape From New York.
Deadline is reporting that the Austin-based director is in talks for the remake with 20th Century Fox, who picked up the remake rights back in 2015. Luther‘s Neil Cross is set on the screenplay detail, though I wouldn’t be surprised if a draft goes through Rodriguez’s hands simply because the writer has often had some writing credit on his films.
Carpenter is involved with the project, receiving an executive producer credit. Deadline states that he will “have a big say in the tone of the project.” The site also reports that the studio is hoping “to reinvent the property with an eye toward launching a Planet Of The Apes-like franchise.”
In the original film, in the far flung future of 1997, Manhattan has been surrounded by a giant wall and turned into a maximum security prison where anything goes on the inside. When Air Force One crashes in midtown, the government recruits criminal Snake Plissken, Kurt Russell in a career-redefining role, to rescue the President.
Rodriguez has just completed filming on the manga adaptation Alita: Battle Angel for Fox.
This is not the first time a remake of Escape From New York has been attempted. In 2007 co-rights holder StudioCanal had Gerard Butler attached to play Snake Plissken in a planned remake with Len Wiseman originally selected to direct. After he dropped out, StudioCanal briefly looked at Brett Ratner as a possible replacement before moving on to have Jonathan Mostow rewrite the screenplay with a possibility of directing as well. Around this time, Butler dropped out. By 2010, Allan Loeb was writing a new screenplay for New Line Cinema, who had picked up the project, with Breck Eisner was attached to direct. Late in the year, Jeremy Renner was said to be in talks to play Snake, but by July 2011, this iteration of the project was dead. Uber-producer Joel Silver briefly developed a remake in 2013 but ultimately passed on putting it into production, paving the way for Fox to acquire the rights in 2015.
