The saga of the attempt to reboot John Carpenter's 1981 action classic Escape From New York has been unfolding for years. Disney's 20th Century Studios is hoping it has found the filmmaking team to actually make it happen – Ready Or Not/recent Scream directing team Radio Silence, AKA directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, alongside producer Chad Villella.
As he has done with the latest Halloween movies, Carpenter will be an executive producer on the new movie, which will attempt the difficult task of finding someone to play Snake Plisskin (as brought to such gruff, charismatic life by Kurt Russell).
No writer is attached yet, but whoever takes on that task will need to come up with a new take on the story — set in a grungy future world, it sees convicted criminal Snake sent into the prison island of Manhattan to rescue the President, whose plane has crashed inside its walls.
The biggest question is whether the movie will actually get made this time…
Want to get the most from Empire? Sign up for Empire Membership!
Get exclusive content, new member-only rewards, access to the latest issue of the magazine plus our back-issue archive, and much more.