At the start of last month, it was revealed by the team at Twitch that Max Payne director John Moore was at the head of the list to bring John McClane back to our screens for the fifth, currently untitled Die Hard outing. Well, now things just took a turn for the official as 20th Century Fox has decided that he’s the man for the gig.
You might recall that the search was kicked off again after original choice Noam Murro was poached to make 300 spin-off Battle of Artemisia. While the likes of Joe Cornish, Justin Lin, Paul McGuigan, Gary Fleder and even Drive’s Nicolas Winding Refn were considered (there’s some part of us that would kill to see what Refn would’ve done with McClane’s world), it ultimately came down to the all-important issue of pleasing Bruce Willis.
We’d like to think the selection process involved interested directors having to run an obstacle course while Willis threw old wigs from his movies at them, but sadly it was a much more mundane series of meetings that saw Moore convince Brucie that he could handle the budget and deliver solid, CG-limited action. And that he loved McClane more than his own family. Well, maybe loved them equally…
Now the amiable, sweary Irishman will be the man to shoot Skip Woods’ script, which apparently finds McClane and his son dealing with a threat in Russia.
But while we’re talking about Bruce Willis picking directors, the Deadline story also includes a mention that the actor is now looking at possible people to take on the Red sequel for Summitsince the first film's director Robert Schwentke is busy making R.I.P.D. Mention is made of Breck Eisner, but it’s early days on that hunt right now...