I’ve got to admit that when I first heard about the Death Race remake, I wasn’t all that enthusiastic about it… but more and more that’s changing. When we hear stuff like this:
Joan Allen, hot off box office champ “The Bourne Ultimatum,” is buckling up for “Death Race,” a remake of the Roger Corman cult classic. “Deadwood” villain Ian McShane and actor/singer Tyrese Gibson also are in the starting lineup for the action-thriller, which stars Jason Statham.
“Death Race” sees a future America in which prison inmates are forced to brutally compete in an enclosed arena. Statham will play a prisoner who, with only weeks to go before his release, is coerced into being a driver and becomes the crowd favorite called Frankenstein. Allen will play the warden of the prison who runs the race and ruthlessly forces Statham to enter the arena. McShane will play a coach, while Gibson is a sociopathic racer named Machine Gun Joe who seeks to escape from prison.
I’m appreciating Joan Allen more and more. The lady is just money in the bank (talent wise anyway). I still remember the first time I really noticed her was in Face Off… then she totally kicked ass in Pleasentville, and she’s been taking names ever since. She was also probably the strongest supporting character in Bourne Ultimatum… and that’s saying something because you had some real heavyweights in that one.
Back to Death Race. Seeing Allen in a role like the Warden would be a bit of a departure for her, and I like that. A mean, nasty Joan Allen is one thing we haven’t really seen from her yet, and I’d pumped for it.
Statham/Allen sounds like a winning combo to me. i could be interested.
Tyrese still can’t to save his life though :-)
if you havent seen the original, go get it! Fucking awsome! Running people over for points!!! Kinda cheesy-spoff like but awsome none-the-less.
This is horrible. The original story is so much better – they fight in an arena!?! Wow. How sad.
Remakes like this totally blow because they alienate the original audience, and they end up sucking so bad no one else would want to see it.
another remake, yawn
I want to be excited about this movie after all, the cast they’re rounding up is pretty damned good, but Anderson hasn’t exactly directed great stuff. I’ll cut him some slack for “Resident Evil” – still not great but it was fun – but the rest of his stuff?
I’m worried.
She’s looking better than she did in Face Off – Damn she was butt ugly in that movie.
Oh, you can bet your ass that they will jettison all the gratuitous nudity as well.
/OK, I’ll stop flooding this thread with short comments now.
I hope they keep “The Handgrenade”
Biggest laugh in the original. !
Heh. Herby. Looks like great minds think alike. Simultaneous posting!
Holy “Re-Imagining” batman. That film sounds even more like “THE RUNNING MAN” than the original (a definite pre-cursor and probably the main influence on the changes made to S.King’s short story, The Running Man).
Other than some character names, this sounds very little like the Roger Corman one, which was about killing civilians for the pleasure of the masses need for violent sport. And ultimately throwing down a President that pretty much has declared himself king and emperor and blames all of the US’s problems (economy, terrorism) on the French.
Still. Sweet cast. I like seeing Allen playing tough. She is a firecracker in “The Contender” as well.
Well from the plot it’s more of a re-imagining then a remake. Frankenstein and Machine Gun Joe were not prisoners forced to compete in the race, they were willing participants. Joan Allen as the Warden seems to be a way to expand the roll of The President of the United States from the original. It also sounds like the campy comedy from the original is going to be eliminated to make this a straight Action-Drama.
Death-Race 2000 is my favorite Corman film. This new version sounds interesting, but can in no way compete with the original classic.