Eclectic Pictures and Hollywood Ventures Group are teaming on a \u201cfemale-driven expansion\u201d of The Expendables franchise, tentatively titled Expendabelles.<\/p>\n
Sound familiar? It is. Ever since the first Expendables hit theaters in 2010 and went on to gross north of $100 million \u2014 effectively launching a Sylvester Stallone-led franchise that has now produced a total of four movies \u2014\u00a0a handful of filmmakers have tried to crack a version starring women in the lead roles.<\/p>\n
More from The Hollywood Reporter<\/p>\n
Back in 2014, Legally Blonde helmer Robert Luketic was set to direct a version penned by that film\u2019s scribes, Kirsten Smith and Karen McCullah, for Millennium Films that was to center on female operatives who had to pose as call girls to rescue a nuclear scientist being held hostage, a plot that surely would be eviscerated online today.<\/p>\n
That version never came to fruition, and nearly a decade later, Millennium\u2019s Jeffrey Greenstein told The Hollywood Reporter that one of the challenges<\/a> with getting that project off the ground was \u201ctrying to find a way to justify why we\u2019d have a woman team.\u201d<\/p>\n The first Expendables starred Stallone alongside the likes of Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Randy Couture, Steve Austin, Terry Crews, Mickey Rourke and more. Bruce Willis, Liam Hemsworth, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Harrison Ford, Wesley Snipes, Mel Gibson, Glen Powell, Antonio Banderas, Victor Ortiz, and others turned up in later installments.<\/p>\n But Eclectic and HVG think they\u2019ve found a way forward with the project, part of a new features slate of \u201cglobally commercial films\u201d they are developing together, which was unveiled Friday at the Cannes Film Festival where producers are in talks with distribution partners, financiers and creative talent.<\/p>\n Per the news, Expendabelles will serve as an origin story set in the late 1990s during the height of Y2K-era tension and geopolitical uncertainty. The newly reimagined project \u2014 originally conceived more than a decade ago alongside Millennium by Heidi Jo Markel, Patrick Muldoon and Julie Kroll \u2014 plans to introduce a new generation of elite female operatives in \u201ca stylized, action-driven cinematic event designed to expand the mythology of the franchise while standing firmly on its own,\u201d the filmmakers tell THR, adding that it is moving forward \u201cwith the support of Lionsgate.\u201d After all, the studio acquired the rights<\/a> to the Expendables franchise late last year.<\/p>\n Expendabelles will be produced by Eclectic\u2019s Markel with HVG co-founder Glenn Gainor. The executive producer team includes HGV co-founder Sandy Climan, Thirteenth Studios\u2019 Joe Smith, Nelly Kim, Kroll, Stephen R. Foreht and John Yarincik. Eclectic Pictures and HVG are currently in the packaging phase and are \u201cactively assembling\u201d creative talent to fire up the spin-off film.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are thrilled to finally bring Expendabelles to life alongside our incredible partners at Hollywood Ventures Group, who share our passion for reimagining this property on a much larger cinematic scale,\u201d Markel said in a statement. \u201cThere has always been a strong global appetite for female-driven action franchises, and we believe the time is now to introduce a bold new generation of elite operatives into this universe. What excites us most is the opportunity to elevate the material by pairing it with top-tier creative talent and delivering a fresh, stylish, adrenaline-fueled experience for worldwide audiences.\u201d<\/p>\n Said HVG co-founder Glenn Gainor: \u201cWe see this as an opportunity to honor the DNA of what made The Expendables resonate globally, while evolving it in a way that feels both timely and commercially compelling. This is a world audiences know, but we\u2019re introducing them to it in a way they\u2019ve never seen before.\u201d<\/p>\n The all-female action franchise has been a tough nut to crack for Hollywood producers in recent years. A few years back in Cannes, Jessica Chastain and Simon Kinberg made a splash by hard-launching their femme-focused The 355, which starred the Oscar winner opposite Penelope Cruz, Fan Bingbing, Diane Kruger and Lupita Nyong\u2019o. The Universal Pictures release hit theaters in 2022, but landed with thud, grossing a mere $27 million worldwide. The 2019 reboot of the Charlie\u2019s Angels franchise was considered a disappointment, earning just $17 million at the domestic box office and $73 million worldwide.<\/p>\n Best of The Hollywood Reporter<\/p>\n Sign up for THR’s Newsletter<\/a>. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Eclectic Pictures and Hollywood Ventures Group are teaming on a \u201cfemale-driven expansion\u201d of The Expendables franchise, tentatively titled…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":428952,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[65924,10908,1098,14400,219829,156,219832,47974,219831,219828,219833,38490,176927,219834,219830,409,111,139,69,80914,219835,219836,82682,74669],"class_list":["post-428951","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-antonio-banderas","tag-arnold-schwarzenegger","tag-bruce-willis","tag-cannes-film-festival","tag-eclectic-pictures","tag-entertainment","tag-expendabelles","tag-harrison-ford","tag-heidi-jo-markel","tag-hollywood-ventures-group","tag-hvg","tag-jason-statham","tag-jean-claude-van-damme","tag-kirsten-smith","tag-millennium-films","tag-movies","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-randy-couture","tag-robert-luketic","tag-the-expendables-franchise","tag-the-hollywood-reporter","tag-wesley-snipes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=428951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428951\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/428952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=428951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=428951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=428951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}