News has broken of the involvement of Academy Award-winning actor Adrien Brody in 20th Century Fox’s forthcoming “Predators,” a redux of the ’80s actioner starring Arnold Schwarzenegger that again comes to suggest Hollywood cares more about utilizing established name-brands rather than groundbreaking ideas to sell movie tickets.
After all, who wants to go back 20 years to see a film when it’s only ever going to get re-tooled in the name of unoriginality.
Topher Grace is rumoured to be set to participate, too, while Nimrod Antal (previously of “Vacancy” and “Kontroll”) is in position to direct. Also among the early cast list are the likes of Alice Braga, Danny Trejo, Oleg Taktarov and Walter Goggins — none of whom seem likely to bring much of amazement to proceedings, which will likely be heavily indebted to the original John McTiernan-directed film.
It’s another attempt to build a new franchise out of a pre-existing one (and one already crossed with another series, “Alien,” before) that might only get fans of action movies excited, though those seeking a Brody-starring thrill-pic would best be served with Peter Jackson’s “King Kong,” in which Brody memorably features.
For others, it might be hard to muster anticipation for a flick that seems neither necessary nor particularly inspired — it stinks of studio filmmaking above a more personal, humble motive.
To director Antal’s credit, he’s already done film enough to suggest the faint chance he could make “Predators” work in the same adrenalised way the original did. While I haven’t seen the popular “Kontroll,” he brought a great deal of suspense and endearing B-movie tactics to 2007’s “Vacancy,” likely his strongest claim to being a good action/thriller director.
Production is headed by Robert Rodriguez (of 1997’s “Desperado” and 2007’s “Planet Terror”), who along with Fox has brought in Alex Litvak and Michael Finch to aide in writing a script, neither of whom have previous writing credits.
For an indication that star Brody’s heart is in the right place, however, Variety states that he and Paradigm reps lobbied hard for the role — so at least there’s a sign he’s passionate about what will be his first action hero role. He’ll occupy the mercenary role Schwarzenegger previously made famous.
As of this writing, “Predators” is scheduled for release July 7, 2010.
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So, if I asked you to guess which actor would be replacing Arnold in the “Predators” reboot, how many actors would it take before you got to Brody?
Can’t say, but you’d have been waiting a long time for his name.
Interesting choice to say the least.