Well, this one caught us by surprise: Rose McGowan is Red Sonja.
The Planet Terror star has agreed to star as the fearsome and voluptuous female warrior in a big-budget flick from Millennium Films which will start filming in October, with a 2010 release on the cards.
The movie - which is not a remake of the godawful 1985 flick that inflicted Brigitte Nielsen upon us and that remains, even with the likes of Eraser and The Sixth Day on there, a low point on Big Arnie’s CV - will be produced by McGowan’s fiancé, Robert Rodriguez.
He’s a little busy on the directing front, though (he’s currently shooting family comedy, Shorts, with James Spader and Jon Cryer), so Rodriguez will only be wearing his 10-gallon producing hat on this one, although his long-time first AD, Douglas Aarniokoski, will be calling the shots in his directorial debut.
We have to admit that we didn’t think anyone was crying out for another Red Sonja movie, but with McGowan and Rodriguez on board, this certainly shows promise. McGowan may be nine inches shorter than Brigitte Nielsen, but she’s certainly proved capable of showing a lot of cinematic spunk, while Planet Terror indicated that she can handle the physical stuff.
"I do have a very scrappy-do personality," McGowan told USA Today. "I lean toward physicality. The story has characters trashed by life who fight their way back. That is my theme."
Curiously enough, this is not, unlike the oft-mooted and currently-delayed Barbarella remake, a situation where Rodirguez created a vehicle for his missus. Instead, McGowan brought him the script, having already been offered the role.
"I found it very entertaining,” he said. “Sonja was strong, smart, cunning — just about everything she'd have to be to survive.”
Red Sonja was not, as many might think, created by Robert E. Howard, the creator of Conan (which is why Arnie plays a character called Kalidor in the Richard Fleischer movie), but instead Roy Thomas and Barry Windsor-Smith, for their Marvel Comics Conan series back in 1973. (The movie rights, though, don’t belong to Marvel and Sonja’s last few comics appearances have been under the Dynamite Entertainment banner).
Although popular, she’s never been considered a first-tier character, with the stigma of the original movie particularly hard to shake off. But if anyone can do it, Rodriguez – who hasn’t seen the original, funnily enough – can, and he has full faith in McGowan’s ability to carry a movie that, it seems, will make it into cinemas before the long-delayed Conan remake.
"Rose is a pistol,” added the admittedly biased Rodriguez. “She's whip-smart, has attitude to burn, is sexy, extremely strong, yet has a vulnerable side that would surprise her closest friends. That description also fits Red Sonja."
So, what do you think, readers? Is this a good idea? Do you have a secret soft spot for the Nielsen flick? Are you excited by the idea of McGowan fighting beasties in a skimpy chain-mail bikini? Or should she and Rodriguez leave Red Sonja well alone?