The ripples from the tragic death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the western “Rust” continues to impact the film industry.
This week, on the red carpet of the premiere of the mega-budget Netflix action film “Red Notice,” actor Dwayne Johnson made the pledge that all of his future productions will only use rubber guns. He tells Variety:
“I can’t speak for anyone else, but I can tell you, without an absence of clarity here, that any movie that we have moving forward with Seven Bucks Productions – any movie, any television show, or anything we do or produce – we won’t use real guns at all. […] We’re going to switch over to rubber guns, and we’re going to take care of it in post. […] We’re not going to worry about the dollars; we won’t worry about what it costs.”
He adds that there are safety protocols and measures that were always taken in the movie business, but “accidents do happen” and when an incident like this happens: “the most prudent thing and the smartest thing to do is just pause for a second and really re-examine how you’re going to move forward.”
Johnson also spoke about the future of the “Fast and Furious” spin-off franchise “Hobbs & Shaw”. The actor has already said how he’s done with the main ‘Furious’ series and speaking to Sirius XM recently, he teased an idea that would give his Luke Hobbs character a definitive ending:
“When it comes to Hobbs and Shaw, which we loved and loved making that movie, there’s an idea that I had that I called [Universal Pictures chairwoman] Donna Langley, called our writer Chris Morgan, our producer Hiram Garcia, and I said, ‘I have this idea and this direction for [Hobbs and Shaw 2].’ And I pitched, and it would be, without giving it away… it would be the antithesis of what Fast & Furious movies generally are in that they continue to go on and go on and go on.
In this case, I wanted to and still want to do the quintessential Hobbs movie that, again without giving it away, that you watch a man walk off into the sunset… I said, ‘We have an opportunity here to go against the grain and let’s disrupt things a little bit and let’s create a movie within the Fast & Furious world that is unexpected.'”
That sounds like he intends that the “Hobbs & Shaw” sequel would be the last in that spin-off series, short and sharp in comparison to the “Fast and Furious” films which sit and nine and with at least two more to go.
