We all know that two wrongs generally don’t make a right, and this next bit is definitely going to challenge the elasticity of that saying. MGM is taking the remake trend to extremes by offering up to the gods the cult action thriller Road House, arguably the most memorable example of a guy-friendly performance from Patrick Swayze. (I mean yeah, Red Dawn, but Road House!) Neither Christopher Nolan nor David O. Russell is taking this one on, though, and the job has gone to Rob Cohen, arguably best known for bringing The Fast and the Furious into the world.
It would be nice to sit here for a couple of hours wondering why anyone thinks Road House is so complicated a movie that it can’t just be replicated in a different way that doesn’t involve remaking it, we won’t. Instead, I’ll just toss it out there that the movie Cohen directed before F&F was The Skulls. We really don’t need this remake.
But it’s coming, according to TheWrap, with a screenplay written by Michael Stokes, who is currently developing another Cohen project, the action movie Crash Bandits. Otherwise, however, he’s written a line of B-movies, including the upcoming Infiltrators, which he also directed. Maybe it’s not worth reading too much into Stokes’ work, as the original film was definitely a B-movie that just happened to have a couple of movie stars in it, and one of them ripped another man’s throat out. But I don’t see how that particular jolt of lightning can possibly strike twice. I mean, just look at this. Spoilers for anyone who hasn’t seen Swayze rip throat before.
Nobody fights like this in movies anymore; only in professional wrestling. The basic story of the film, a man with a past gets a job as a bouncer at a rowdy honkytonk, is easy enough to replicate with all variety of backstory going into it, but you can’t match these fights.
Cohen, who is currently filming the Blumhouse Productions thriller The Boy Next Door with Jennifer Lopez, was last responsible for 2008’s needless The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor and last year’s completely ludicrous Alex Cross.
Let’s not forget that other Swayze-starring cheese-fest getting remade: Point Break. Let us know in the poll below which one sounds better to you, and try not to punch your electronic devices in the process.
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