Legendary film scribe Shane Black returned this week with “Play Dirty,” a hardboiled crime action thriller starring Mark Wahlberg and LaKeith Stanfield.
Black co-wrote and directs the film which marks his fifth feature as director following the acclaimed “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang,” the divisive Marvel film “Iron Man 3,” the well-liked “The Nice Guys,” and the widely panned “The Predator”.
Sadly reviews for “Play Dirty” aren’t much better than “The Predator” with the title at just 50/100 on Metacritic and 49% on Rotten Tomatoes. Still, Black has had his name attached to a number of projects in recent years and recently spoke abiout them with The Discourse Podcast.
First up, he looked back at “Iron Man 3” – a movie that feels very much like a Shane Black movie, retaining his signature style in ways few other filmmakers in that universe have been able to do (James Gunn and Ryan Coogler being the other obvious ones). He says he has no plans to go back, despite it being an interesting experience:
“That was pretty much a one-off. They’re very fond of trying directors who hadn’t done a lot, and at the time, I hadn’t. It was a graceful thing they did, installing me and allowing me to exercise even that much flex. I watched a machine at work, like Byzantine gears and cogs, everything meshed to make this thing called Iron Man. For me, it was like riding that railroad. Let the machine do its job; let the process work for you. Don’t fight it. Just go with it.”
Next, he discussed the calls online for a follow-up to “The Nice Guys” which has a fan base but sadly didn’t perform well enough commercially:
“You have to get those actors back. You have to dish up something that feels enticing enough for them to say, ‘Okay, there’s a reason to do another one.’ Ultimately, buying out the rights, getting the actors, and making a sequel to a movie that flopped… let’s be honest, Nice Guys flopped. But I’d love to do another ‘Nice Guys’ movie. If you’re out there and have access to funds, let’s make it happen.”
Black also wrote the original “Lethal Weapon” and was asked about a fifth one. He says he’s not involved with any future entry, but is curious to see where it goes:
“That’s a project I’d be happy to see. The trick is to say, ‘This caps the series.’ It bridges the 20-year-plus gap between the fourth and the fifth one in the story and gives it more resonance. That’s a tough thing to do.”
Finally, there is Black’s long in development dream project – an adaptation of pulp hero “Doc Savage”. Much like with Guillermo del Toro’s “At the Mountains of Madness,” the main issue is financials – the work requires too big of a budget and is of an IP people aren’t familiar with:
“We have a script, but it’s very expensive. Are people willing to spend the money it would take to bring ‘Doc Savage’ to the screen on an IP that is less recognizable to the public? That’s the question. I mean, it was the original ‘Indiana Jones,’ right? Yeah. I mean, Doc Savage was named Clark, and he was a precursor to Superman; then, they had a Superman named Clark after that. So this was the OG. ‘Doc Savage’ was the original.”
“Play Dirty” is now available to stream on Amazon Prime Video.
