Okay, that’s not official, but I’m going by the time honored rule that if the insider Hollywood people report a “short list” of possible directors it will go to one of the worst or least interesting on the list. For example this happened with THE WOLFMAN (Joe Johnston over John Landis, Frank Darabont, Bill Condon). In this case Deadline is reporting three directors people around here like and John Moore.
The alleged candidates:
1. Joe Cornish. This is the guy that directed ATTACK THE BLOCK. I haven’t gotten to see it yet, but everybody tells me I should. He also wrote THE ADVENTURES OF TINTIN with friend of the internet Edgar Wright. I have no opinion yet but I plan to see ATTACK THE BLOCK.
2. Justin Lin – FAST AND THE FURIOUS 3-5, plus that BETTER LUCK TOMORROW movie and FINISHING THE GAME. He has shown a penchant for good practical action and stuntwork, charismatic and manly characters, nice visuals and a good sense of humor. I would hope his DIE HARD would be a little more grounded than his FAST FIVE, but I think he would be a good choice. Possible drawback: could delay FURIOUS SIX. Possible bonus: could delay TERMINATOR 5: TERMINATION OF THE TERMINATRIX.
3. Nicolas Winding Refn. This kind of seems like the most interesting choice on the list, but I gotta admit I’ve only seen BRONSON and I honestly didn’t love it as much as you’re supposed to. I’ll have to check out the PUSHER trilogy and VALHALLA RISING, which I’ve heard good things about, and of course his new one DRIVE everybody is excited about. Plus I think there’s one more action movie lined up after that one.
And then it’s John Moore, who did BEHIND ENEMY LINES, FLIGHT OF THE PHOENIX, THE OMEN REMAKE and MAX PAYNE. I don’t know, did anybody see FLIGHT OF THE PHOENIX? I think I might’ve heard it was pretty good. I saw MAX PAYNE and it did have a couple good parts, but not enough to imply that he could handle a DIE HARD. He did all his movies at Fox and apparently they like hanging out with him or whatever so they look at him for every big movie that comes up, like THE WOLVERINE and everything. (Then again they didn’t choose him for that one, so maybe we’ll get lucky here.)
Anyway, they’re saying this one will take place in Russia, will have McClane teamed with his son (not seen or mentioned in the series since he was a little kid), and is still unfortunately written by Skip Woods, whose best movie I’m sorry to say has gotta be THE A-TEAM. He wrote and directed the painful Tarantino ripoff THURSDAY and wrote SWORDFISH (aka Halle’s Berries), HITMAN and X-MEN’S ORIGINS PRESENTS WOLVERINE. So you see, there are alot of obstacles for McClane to deal with on this one.
August 2nd, 2011 at 1:29 am
Can’t be worse than part 4, which might be the first movie that I like for having well staged and directed action scenes, but hate it so much for everything else, that I never want to watch it again.
I doubt Joe Cornish will take the gig, just because he seems to be allowed whatever he wants to do in the UK. He has at least one more “personal” movie in him, before he moves to paycheck gigs.
Justin Lin seems to be too busy with FAST & FURIOUS movies. He was already attached to every other big action movie of the last few years and I doubt he will change the franchise at this point either.
Refn: Got no idea. He seems not unlikely, considering that he isn’t in Hollywood for that long. But if DRIVE becomes a hit, he might pick a better project.
I also think that it’s either gonna be Moore (since he is obviously FOX’s go to guy for rushed productions, when Brett Ratner is either not available or too expensive) or maybe another, completely unexpected candidate who will pop up out of the blue. Most likely a first time director with some Britney Spears videos under his belt.
Also you have to keep in mind that the thing with the WOLFMAN director, was a question of availability. Kinda like back when the original director decided to quit a few hours before shooting started, they just took the first who crossed the street in front of their office. (And then was not allowed to offer any input while shooting.)