10 Movies You Won't Believe They Tried To Remake

10. Escape from New York

John Carpenter movies have such a unique style and tonality to them that remakes are always going to leave his fans up in arms, and boy, they were not happy when a remake of cult classic Escape from New York was first announced.

A remake of the 1981 Kurt Russell-starring sci-fi actioner began development in 2007, with Gerard Butler initially signed to play a rebooted version of the Snake Plissken character, while Len Wiseman (Underworld) was tapped to direct.

Wiseman ended up departing the project and was replaced by Brett Ratner (Rush Hour), who also later left, and as the creative process continued to stall, New Line Cinema cancelled the remake in 2011.

In 2015 however, Fox took a crack at it, with Robert Rodriguez set to direct a script written by Leigh Whannell (Saw) with Carpenter himself lined up to produce. Kurt Russell's son Wyatt was even approached to star as Snake, but turned it down.

Rodriguez ended up exiting and was replaced by Radio Silence (Ready or Not, Scream) in 2022, though by the end of that year the project had been reimagined as a direct sequel to the original rather than a remake.

That's certainly less sacrilegious to fans, but honestly, if Kurt Russell's not involved does anyone actually care?