It was only a few days ago that we brought you the news that Upgrade director Leigh Whannell is writing and directing a new take on The Invisible Man for Blumhouse and Universal Studios, and now we've learned he's been brought on board to write a remake of John Carpenter's Escape from New York for Fox!
The Hollywood Reporter breaks the news, “Sources say that while there is no deal for him to direct, the door is open for that possibility.”
“Whannell is kickstarting Escape with a new vision for the project that sources say will retain elements of the original but bring new ideas to the table. One of Whannell’s goals is to avoid the bloated tentpole remake path that afflicted the reboots of other 1980s-era movies such as RoboCop and Total Recall.”
The original 1981 movie, which starred Kurt Russell as Snake Plissken, was set in a future (then 1997) where Manhattan had been turned into an island-sized maximum-security prison. When the president of the United States crashes into the decaying city, an outlaw is coerced into traveling inside to rescue him.
Andrew Rona and Alex Heineman will produce with John Carpenter executive producing!