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Filmmaker Joe Carnahan and actor Frank Grillo made waves last week with the announcement that they’re spearheading a remake of The Raid, but that’s not all the duo have cooking up. Shortly after news of The Raid hit, Collider’s own Steve Weintraub sat down for an extended interview with the two about their plans for this new Raid film. But over the course of the conversation, they also touched on a few other upcoming projects that are in the works.
First off, Carnahan offered an update on Sony’s long-gestating Uncharted video game adaptation. Carnahan signed on to pen the script last year, after which Shawn Levy came onboard to direct. Carnahan says he’s turned in his draft and he's pretty sure it has the support of Naughty Dog:
“The script went in, the script got huge, it got a big round of applause at Sony, they were very, very happy with it. So I don’t know, we’ll see what the casting comes out [as]. Shawn Levy was brilliant; we worked together for a couple months on it… There was a lot of pressure because I’ve got friends over there at Sony, Jonathan Kadin, obviously Tom Rothman and I go way back, Doug Belgrad—these are like my guys. So I felt an additional weight of like, ‘I gotta deliver them something they’ll make.’ It’s got four of the most insane—I’ve never written crazier shit in terms of an action sequence than what’s in that movie… I’m very happy with the script, and listen it was important that I got Amy Hennig’s approval, her and Nolan North, and what I’ve heard is the Naughty Dog guys are really happy with it. But who knows? That could be like Donald Trump hearing something; that may not be true at all.”
Carnahan also still hopes his Narc TV series adaptation comes to fruition. The pilot is written, and last we heard Eminem was signing on to executive produce and create new music. While the project isn’t yet set up at a network, Carnahan says the show is in the vein of Fargo in that Detroit is a major piece of the puzzle:
“It’s in that world—like the TV show Fargo is in the world of Fargo, same thing. Detroit, it’s really cool.”
And finally, as post-production is finishing up on the actioner Wheelman starring Grillo and produced by Carnahan, the filmmaker says they’re aiming high with the Netflix original film:
CARNAHAN: I’m not talking out of school, if it’s cool, if Netflix is open to it, we wanna go like Director’s Fortnight at Cannes. We think it’s that good.
GRILLO: And if you’re a fan of anything in the ‘70s that is Death Wish-esque, that is Escape from New York, anything of that style it’s that kind of film. And this kid Jeremy Rush who wrote the script, who directed it, is gonna be shot out of a cannon.
Wheelman is an original actioner that stars Grillo as a getaway driver who realizes he’s been double-crossed and seeks revenge. Netflix hasn’t set a premiere date just yet, but Carnahan says they’re just finishing up the sound mix now and clearly has high hopes for the critical reception.
Check out the full conversation about Uncharted, Narc, and Wheelman in the video above.
