One of the saddest deaths in the world of cinema over the past 20 years has been the classic western. While there have been the occasional hits (Unforgiven, Open Range, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford) and the Coen Brothers' appear to be making some efforts to bring it back (No Country For Old Men, their upcoming remake of True Grit), the western genre is a shadow of its former self. With recent developments, however, it might be ready to make a comeback.
Paramount Pictures has picked up a spec script titled The Further Adventures of Doc Holliday, which they hope to turn into a summer tentpole, according to Variety. The spec was written by Chad St. John, who does not currently have any titles to his name (yet has an IMDb page?), but his name has been attached to Warner Bros. remake of the Sean Connery film Outland and his script The Days Before ranked as the 10th best unproduced screenplay on this year's Black List.
While I would be ecstatic to see a genre so important to the history of film return, I'm not happy that it may come as the result of a Lorenzo di Bonaventura production. The whole thing reeks of Wild Wild West and that's a vomit-worthy smell. And while westerns may only come every now and then these days, the best possible Doc Holliday was already done by Val Kilmer in Tombstone, and there is no way to top that.
