Caffeinated Clint
Cedric Nicolas-Troyan is the latest point-and-shooter aboard Summit’s long-in-the-works “Highlander” reboot, according to Deadline.
The filmmaker, promoted from his role as visual effects supervisor and second unit director on 2012’s “Snow White And The Huntsman”, tells the trade he’s a big-time fan of the franchise – which kicked off in 1986 with Russell Mulcahy’s film – and his knowledge of the TV series spin-off would attest to that.
Nicolas-Troyan apparently whipped the undies off the Summit execs with his pitch.
“I have been working on my pitch for this since the summer, and when I got there I met the original producer and I just started geeking out and he loved it,” Nicolas-Troyan told me. “The first movie came out when I was a teenager in France and it was one of my favorite films of those years. I loved the series also, they shot a lot of it in France, on the Seine River. My first reaction, like everybody else, was, really, do we need a remake? Then I read the script, and I thought about how Russell Mulcahy was this super visual video director who brought the pulse of the 80s to the film so well. I started thinking about taking those great characters and matching them with a modern, visceral take, and then I was in love with the idea and I just went for it.”
Though he admits he enjoyed the “Highlander” series, Nicolas-Troyan says the first and original film is the best. Duh.
“For me, it all comes down to that first movie, but there are great themes in the show,” he said. “It’s the rare cross-genre concept that has elements of the Western, time travel, fantasy, action, contemporary. There are universal themes, but of course you need to provide the answers like the first film did. Who are these guys with swords? Why are they fighting each other? What is the prize and how are they drawn to each other? There is far more at work here I want to explore than the lightning that happens during the Quickening.”
Though he doesn’t specifically say he wants to find an unknown to play the lead, the director hints at finding some relatively fresh blood to star in the film (as opposed to Ryan Reynolds, who was originally attached).
“Back then Christopher hadn’t done a lot of things and was just emerging, and Sean Connery, that movie brought about a real resurgence for him,” said Nicolas-Troyan. “We have to find that younger emerging guy, and surround him with a strong Kurgan, and an actor who shines as Ramirez the way Connery did in that film film.”
Get Queen on the phone, pronto!
