Death Wish is a movie that’s been remade to the point where it’s damn near a subgenre to itself. Now, Eli Roth is directing Bruce Willis in a new remake, which is an honest-to-goodness remake.
According to the news at The Hollywood Reporter, Eli Roth is directing the film for MGM and Paramount, who have long wanted to redo the 1974 Charles Bronson cult classic. And Willis, who hasn’t don’t anything of note for a long, long time – mostly because of his growing reputation as a prick – will take over the Charlie B. vigilante role.
Roth’s recent films have been less than stellar as well. From the ridiculous Knock Knock to The Green Inferno, most of his work has been VOD late-night fodder. This appears to be a major release for two big studios putting a lot in this Death Wish basket.
It could work, though the time capsule nature of the original Death Wish – taking place in a New York City that was funneling down the toilet with crime and corruption – was what made Death Wish so indelible. From Death Wish spawned three (or four?) sequels, all worse than the last one, and a Kevin Bacon remake somewhere in the mid-2000s. But that one was called Death Sentence… totally different.
