Gambino will mark the first time Nicolas Cage and John Woo have collaborated in almost 25 years.
Excellent news for fans of doves, slow motion, personal honour, and bloodshed, heroic or otherwise: Nicolas Cage will be reteaming with his Face/Off director John Woo for the upcoming crime drama Gambino, a biopic of New York City crime figure Carlo Gambino. This marks the first time the two have worked together since the 2002 World War II drama, Windtalkers.
Now, admittedly, Windtalkers was terrible. But here’s the thing: John Woo directed some of the greatest action movies of all time, so he kinda gets a lifetime pass. Yes, he made Paycheck, but he also made The Killer, Hard Boiled, Hard Target, and Face/Off, so every time a new Woo project comes down the pike, I feel honour bound to give it a spin. And as for Nicolas Cage – well, he’s Nicolas Cage, and always worth keeping an eye on, like a dormant volcano or a sleeping crocodile.
As for Gambino, Deadline has a synopsis for us:
The movie will follow Oscar winner Cage’s Carlo Gambino, a butcher’s son from Sicily, who rules New York’s underworld with quiet authority. But when his death sends shockwaves through the city, Pulitzer-winning journalist Jimmy Breslin follows the trail he left behind to uncover the man beneath the legend. Through the voices of those who loved him and those who feared him, Breslin peels back the composure that masked Gambino’s ruthlessness, revealing how this outsider rose to redefine power, loyalty and the American dream.
The script is by George Gallo and Nick Vallelonga (Green Book). Apparently the project has been kicking around for a few years, but has been heavily revised for Cage and Woo. Maybe moving it away from a straight crime drama to something more operatic and bloody, as is Woo’s specialty? We can only hope. But while we ponder this mystery, here’s the hospital corridor shoot out from the third act of Hard Boiled to remind us why we should be excited.
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