Variety reported earlier today that Chad Stahelski will produced an English-language remake of the Indian action film Kill. The original Kill is being released by Lionsgate Pictures this coming Thursday, July 4th and they will team up with Stahelski and his banner, 87Eleven Entertainment.
The Indian 'John Wick on a train' action flick premiered at TIFF last September and made a big impression on myself at the time. I can say that an English-language remake is just fine by me and will likely end up stripping away a lot of the first act, sorry, a lot of the melodrama in the first act without hopefully not stripping away the lead charcter's motivation for going on their deadly rampage.
A film like Kill is ripe for adapting to a Western audience's tastes because we've come to expect highly detailed and graphic violence from the likes of Stahelski. The close quarters combat in the Indian action film must have had action designers and choreographers chomping at the bit to adapt as their own. I wonder if Stahelski will divulge how many emails, texts and voicemails he will have received from industry professionals once news broke that he'd be behind a project like this.
"Chad, Hope this email, text, voicemail finds you well. So, about this Kill remake you're doing..."
“’Kill’ is one of the most vivid, wild, and creative action movies I’ve seen recently,” Stahelski said in a statement. “Nikhil delivers relentless action sequences that need to be seen by as wide an audience as possible. It’s exciting to be developing an English-language version — we have big shoes to fill and I’m looking forward to working with Nikhil, Karan, Apoorva, Guneet, and Achin to achieve that.”“When we made ‘Kill’ with Nikhil Nagesh Bhat, we dreamed of global love, and seeing North American theaters chant ‘Kill! Kill! Kill!’ was like seeing that vision come alive,” producers of the original — Karan Johar, Apoorva Mehta for Dharma Productions, and Guneet Monga Kapoor & Achin Jain from Sikhya Entertainment — said in a joint statement. “This announcement coming before the original film’s release is unprecedented and a big win for Indian cinema. We are truly honored.”