The sad thing is, HIGHLANDER was a mid-tier prestige production that badly tanked at the box office but became a surprise hit afterwards in its video tour. It came out of nowhere, a bonkers fantasy story investing in Connery, Queen and Lambert with a chic video clip aesthetic - that actually trusted its story enough not to weave all kinds of threads for a sequel into the script.
How often does that happen any more? Naturally, they tried to franchise it later as that was the dawn of the age of franchises. But just telling one story in one film and be done with it, how rare has that become? And how many ‘cult classics’ are even made any more?
These days, if you propose a contained story you immediately are asked: could it be a series? Even on the book market you don’t stand as much of a chance of being published if you don’t offer to have at least two more sequels waiting.
It’s always the same argument: “oh, the marketing will be so much easier”, “oh, the real money is in the next installments”, “oh, audiences want to immerse themselves and not stop after one story”.
Yes. Who ever asked for Gone with the Rain, the spectacular sequel to Gone with the Wind? The Name of the Tulip? LOW AFTERNOON? There are stories which don’t need 12 different instalments across all sorts of media - but are they still given a chance in our markets? I’m not optimistic.
IP is one thing, and a valid complaint in a lot of areas, I just can’t see how this was ever popular enough to warrant a remake, even purely for monetary reasons.
It might have the added bonus to the executives that it’s old enough and obscure enough that a decent chunk of today’s targeted audience might just think it’s something entirely new.
Popular enough to make Adrian Paul a Bond contender (for the press anyway). And I seem to remember him being mentioned here a few times by some members, too…
Initially I was sharing @dalton’s scepticism. But the more I think about it the more I can see studio executives hoping for another Mission Impossible success story here: something just obscure enough they can throw money at and hope it sticks with the young crowd. And Cavill may still be looking for his one signature role, and this and WARHAMMER are both up his sword wielding alley.
Highlander has always been a cult franchise rather than a box office success. If you crunch the numbers, it was actually Highlander III that had the highest box office gross, and the only film to break even at the box office. The series is the most successful thing Highlander has produced.
I’m usually the first to roll my eyes at the glut of remakes, but I think Highlander has the best chance of being good. Chad Stahelski is a great choice to direct. He’s a fan of the property and excels in action scenes. But there’s an aspect of John Wick that’s often overshadowed by the action, and that’s the worldbuilding. He did a great job setting up the rules and rituals of the underworld without overwrought exposition, which could translate very well to Highlander.
I’m a little unsure about some of the cast. I’m not exactly a fan of Cavill, but at least he can swing a sword. Crowe wouldn’t have been my first choice for Ramirez either. But the rest are solid.
I remember that people often cited his resemblance to a young Connery. Unfortunately, like most TV actors, Paul ended up doing little of note once his series ended.
No doubt they will maximize the action and set up tons of stuff for sequels.
But I loved the original film because it juxtaposed the gritty contemporary New York with different time zones, had the mysterious and different looking Lambert together with Sean Connery, threatened by Clancy Brown‘s really frightening villain, and all of this was glued together by Queen‘s killer songs.
That cannot be duplicated, and even trying will not stir up the right mix.
Thankfully, it seems like this next one will be the last one.
I still remember going to see the original one in theaters and thinking that it was a solid film. Granted, haven’t seen it since so I have no idea if older me would still feel the same way, but it’s interesting that a film about street racing and car culture could spawn the type of franchise that it spawned.
But, then again, I never would have thought, walking out of Casino Royale, that in fifteen years I would be watching that incarnation of Bond battling a nano-machine DNA virus and taking a rocket to the face in order to stop it.
Doesn’t the story in actually benefit from a short run time? The claustrophobia is then shared with the audience, whilst I don’t think it’s impossible to make a series out of it, the format can’t keep that tension for very long.
