Yeah, you read that right. Jason Statham, the man who never met a butt he couldn't kick vs. mercurial multi-hyphenate James Franco in a balls out brawler written by Rambo himself. Forget The Expendables 2, when does Homefront come out?
Sylvester Stallone's script sounds like every other Statham film you've ever seen, with the scowling actor playing Phil Broker, an ex-DEA agent(*shocked*) who moves his family to a quiet town to escape his past. How do you think that goes? Terrible, of course, as he discovers his new town is ravaged by violence, drug traffickers, and run by an evil meth lord named Gator. Franco will play Gator, adding to a sudden surge of criminal roles for Franco. He plays a a drug dealer in Harmony Korine's Spring Breakers; a killer in The Iceman; and let's not forget his hilarious cameo in The Green Hornet.
As potentially awesome as this sounds, reason for caution comes in the form of Gary Fleder. His career has been a mixed bag, somehow managing to screw up an unscrewupable(yeah I made that up) film like Runaway Jury. But he also did a pretty good job on the football drama, The Express, and found a hit with Kiss the Girls back in the late 90s.
Statham's had a string of flops lately, including the underrated thriller, Safe, earlier this year. Franco continues to do his tapdance between indie films nobody will ever see and mainstream stuff like this that help keep the lights turned on. [Variety]
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