Over the last decade, several movies have escaped development hell, for better or worse. Mad Max: Fury Road leaps to mind in the “better” category, The Dark Tower represents team “worse”. But there is also Uncharted, Alita: Battle Angel, The Man Who Killed Quixote, Deadpool. On a long enough timeline, all films exit development hell. The latest might be The Crow, the remake of the 1994 cult classic starring the late Brandon Lee, who died tragically on set. Some might say remaking the movie is in bad taste, but The Crow was a hit that spawned three sequels and a short-lived television show, so a remake is inevitable, but this film has lingered in development hell with what one might call supernatural determination. Over the years, many leading men have been rumored to be attached to a remake, including Bradley Cooper, Jason Momoa, and Alexander Skarsgard. At one time, Tom Hiddleston supposedly wanted to play Eric Draven so badly he submitted his own makeup test for the part.
But now it appears that The Crow remake is happening for real, with Rupert Sanders of Snow White and the Huntsman fame attached to direct, a projected summer shooting schedule, and not Alex but younger Skarsgard brother Bill attached to star as Draven. Bill Skarsgard makes a lot of sense to play the new Draven. He’s basically where Tom Hiddleston was at a decade ago, a talented actor with a high-profile villain role under his belt—Pennywise, in Skarsgard’s case—just looking for a corresponding hero role to launch him into the stratosphere.
Although the film industry has changed so much in the last decade, I no longer think a role like this can boost an actor onto the A list. I’m not even sure there IS an A list anymore, at least not one like we’ve always known it. Movies work differently now, fame works differently, and starring in The Crow, even with all the attention sure to be on this (probably cursed) production, is no longer a guarantee of making an actor into a household name. Maybe if it spawns another set of sequels (it basically took Tom Holland six Marvel movies to become a household name). But even with money in place and preproduction underway, I remain skeptical of The Crow after years of false starts, so file this under “I will believe it only after I have seen the entire movie and am watching the credits roll”.
