Jason Statham will play a retired criminal coming back for One Last Job in his sixth film with his Lock, Stock director.
Reunited, ’cause it feels so good: Variety is reporting that former Mr Madonna Guy Ritchie‘s next film, the oddly titled Viva La Madness, will star none other than his regular starring partner, Jason Statham.
The pair made their big screen debut together all the way back in 1998 with the cockney crime caper Lock, Stock, And Two Smoking Barrels and continued to work together off and on over the years, producing Snatch, Revolver, Wrath Of Man, and Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre, making Viva La Madness their sixth collaboration.
Based on the 2011 novel by British crime author J.J. Connolly, Viva La Madness will see ol’ Stath as a retired criminal living in the Caribbean who is enticed back to London for one last job. That’s reminiscent of about a million crime thrillers – particularly Sexy Beast at this moment in time – but Viva La Madness is a sequel to Connolly’s earlier book, 2000’s Layer Cake.
There’s a bit of a Guy Ritchie connection there, too. Layer Cake was the basis for Matthew Vaughn’s 2004 directorial debut of the same title, which saw Daniel Craig as a London drug dealer on the verge of retirement who finds himself caught up in the sort of rolling crisis that often shows up in these things. Prior to becoming a director in his own right, Vaughn was Ritchie’s producer. However, Viva La Madness is not a sequel, but a stand alone adaptation.
That’s not much more to report at the moment – Statham is the only cast member attached at the moment and, despite there being a whole-ass book underpinning the entire enterprise, plot details are being kept under wraps. But considering Statham has been wanting to make this one since at least 2013, clearly he thinks it’s a winner. And maybe he’s right! But I’ve seen Operation Fortune, so he could be wrong, too. We shall see.
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