Celebrities

Movies

TV

Music

Theatre & Arts

"Die Hard" director hatches "Escape" remake

(AP)
Updated: 2007-08-15 17:35

Len Wiseman, director of "Live Free or Die Hard," is in negotiations to shoot the remake of "Escape From New York."

The project was set up at New Line in March with "300" star Gerard Butler attached as anti-hero Snake Plissken, a role played by Kurt Russell in John Carpenter's 1981 film.

The original was set in a futuristic 1997, when Manhattan had been turned into a giant maximum-security prison. The U.S. president's plane crashed on the island, and Plissken -- incarcerated for robbing a federal reserve bank -- was coerced into performing a rescue mission. The script for the remake will inject fresh elements.

Wiseman directed his wife, Kate Beckinsale, in "Underworld" and its sequel, "Underworld: Evolution."