James Wan to Direct MacGyver Movie

Posted by on November 12th, 2012   Filed under: Action, Remakes, TV
Source: Variety

Although studio execs are often accused of being unable to think outside the box, this next announcement goes against everything we know about studio execs. Unfortunately, that doesn’t necessarily make it a brilliant move either. For the past couple of years we’ve been hearing talk of a MacGyver feature film based on the popular ’80s TV series. There hadn’t been any updates since they hired a writer back in 2010, but it seemed like the project might have been temporarily shelved due to the MacGruber movie. Now this week we have learned that New Line is actually still moving forward with the movie and they even have a well-known director attached to direct. As it turns out, that director is James Wan, the man behind such horror films as Saw and Insidious. Because… hey, why not?

According to Variety, James Wan has entered into talks with New Line to direct MacGyver. The initial draft of the script was written by Jason Richman (Bangkok Dangerous, Swing Vote) but has since been rewritten by Brian and Mark Gunn (Journey 2: The Mysterious Island). There is no word on whether or not original series star Richard Dean Anderson will be involved, but anything outside of the standard cameo seems unlikely at this point.

The question is, why would they choose a horror director to take on MacGyver? It’s true that Wan has ventured outside of horror territory before, but the Kevin Bacon revenge movie Death Sentence was still a pretty dark and violent genre flick. It would seem that they simply have a lot of confidence in James Wan, particularly after his upcoming horror film The Conjuring scored so high in test screenings that they decided to move it from January to July. Perhaps this version of MacGyver will just build deadly traps for his enemies made out of coconuts and string. Are you game for a MacGyver movie? Is James Wan an inspired choice to direct?



  • La Menthe

    What made MacGyver work was its exaggeration, and the charm that was set in the tune and the square styled episodes. Despite how cheesy it was, it was always interesting (maybe it’s just nostalgia on my part, as I grew up with the series) to see a new adventure with MacGyver in every episode – whether it was spying in Eastern Europe, getting out prisoners in a South-American prison, combating Big Foot in Alaska, or helping local friends like his grandpa in their everyday problems. They were all accompanied by the same composition in directing – the same music, the same suspense-building, the same story structure, etc. This was something they were able to partially maintain in their made-for-TV movies in the 90s. But it will probably never be the same today. They lack the same technological equipment in the camera, effects, etc – not to mention Richard Dean Anderson’s young face and allure. At their best, they could replicate MacGyver on a similar extent as Spielberg did with Indiana Jones in The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull – which we all can agree was a very disappointing affair.

    Comparing MacGyver to Indiana Jones is no exaggeration, as MacGyver in many ways was the TV-version of classical 80’s adventures like Romancing the Stone, Young Sherlock Holmes and The Golden Child .

    We’re probably going to get a typical modern action film disguised as MacGyver – where they move away from the over-elaborated situations he is in to more subtle circumstances, and from MacGyver’s unrealistic ” ingenuity” to inventiveness that stick more closely to reality. I wouldn’t be surprised if the even gave the series a darker and serious tone – something that would totally ruin the series’ magnetism.

  • mattressman

    i tried to rewatch macgyver recently and the appeal is definitely nostalgia. everything else about the show is pretty bad. almost un-watchable. the only episodes that i could get through were the ones that had murdock in them.

  • Chris Klecker

    It’s also possible that James Wan wants to expand his interests into action. There was a time when people didn’t think of John Carpenter as anything but a horror director, but after movies like Big Trouble in Little China or They Live, it’s certainly possible for a director to “surprise” his audience. Granted I’m not a fan of Saw, nor is this writing team helping believe this is going to be a good movie, but anything can happen.