CLIFFHANGER: Sales Art Reveals ‘The Bad Batch’ Director’s Remake Plans For 1993 Action Classic
Filmmaker Ana Lily Amirpour could be on the way to directing a female fronted version of Renny Harlin’s 1993 action blockbuster, Cliffhanger, after spending a year preparing for the project. Indeed, the buzz is real including over at Deadline which also has fresh key art front and center as it will show once it hits the sales floor next week at Cannes. Check it out below!
The original film had actor Sylvester Stallone leaping far and hitting hard as a mountain ranger forced to go toe-to-toe with a gang of mercenaries over a stash of $100 million dollars in missing cash. The film also starred Michael Rooker and John Lithgow and earned upwards of $255 million dollars upon releasing from TriStar, and reportedly tried/failed to undergo remakes and reboots thereafter.
Amirpour reportedly spent a year in preparation, and also took a ten-day hiking tour in the French, Swiss and Italian Alps to “get herself in the zone” according to the report. Rocket Science is heading to Cannes with Amirpour’s Cliffhanger which may add Amirpour’s The Bad Batch co-star Jason Momoa for a cameo role, and will be penned by Sacha Penn (Creed 2).
Neal Moritz (The Fast And The Furious franchise), who had been vying to bring the project under his wing for years before StudioCanal finally relinquished the rights, will be joined by Toby Jaffe in producing the film under their Original Film banner alongside Rocket Science’s Thorsten Schumacher and Lars Sylvest whose company will also finance.
via Deadline:
The filmmaker told us, “I instantly knew the elements of the story I wanted to tell. There’s a special place in my heart for an action-survival movie. I’ve always been attracted to the theme of mountain climbers who, like filmmakers, have a certain madness to them. I love genre and fantasy and in this type of survival film you’re playing with real fear.”
“I am very excited to partner with Original Film and Rocket Science, who share my passion for this character-driven, high-adrenaline story; the survival film is one of my favorite genres,” she continued. “We are setting out to create a thrill-ride on the mountain which taps into the primal side of an action movie, where you see what a person is capable of doing to survive in the most extreme situations, pushed to the limits. Add to that some high-stakes espionage and a badass female mountain climber as the lead and it becomes a truly epic reinvention of what made the original Cliffhanger movie so fun and so thrilling.”
Moritz commented, “I’ve been wanting to re-make this adrenaline filled survival thriller with a strong female protagonist – both in front of and behind the camera – for some time. The elements came together with Ana Lily and Rocket Science and we look forward to gathering the rest of the pieces. I’ve always wanted to make the movies I want to see — big at their core with characters which connect to the audience while simultaneously encouraging them to leave their house and go to a theater. Cliffhanger is just that, in what we hope will be the first of an entirely new franchise.”
Native New Yorker. Lover of all things pizza, chocolate, pets, and good friends. Karaoke hero. Left of center. Survivor. Fond supporter of cult, obscure and independent cinema - especially fond of Asian movies and global action cinema. Author of the bi-weekly Hit List. Founder and editor of Film Combat Syndicate. Still, very much, only human.
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