Sylvester Stallone is arguably the greatest action movie star ever, or at least very high near the top. He has a list of movies a mile long that he could reboot or turn into sequels, but mostly he’s only done that with Rocky and Rambo. Well, that’s about to change because Sly is about to come back for a sequel to…Cliffhanger?
Yeah, Cliffhanger. The Rocket Science studio has announced that Rick Roman Waugh will direct Stallone in a sequel to the 1993 film. Stallone played Gabe Walker, a mountain climber dealing with a recent tragedy who gets in the center of a U.S. Treasury plane heist as it flies through the Rocky Mountains. The original film was directed by Renny Harlin, with Michael Rooker and John Lithgow as co-stars.
Okay, so the original Cliffhanger isn’t great. I watch it mainly for the so-bad-its-good quality at this point. But there’s no denying it is a kind of classic of the era, and earned $255M. There have been attempts to reboot it in the past, including one that had Ana Lily Amirpour attached to direct with her The Bad Batch star Jason Momoa eyed for a cameo.
Waugh is an exciting component, though. He’s been on a roll with films such as Shot Caller, Angel Has Fallen, Greenland, and National Champions. Later this month he’ll reconnect with Gerard Butler for Kandahar.
“Growing up with the biggest action films of the ‘80s and ‘90s, working on many of them myself, ‘Cliffhanger’ was by far one of my favorite spectacles,” Waugh said. “To be at the helm of the next chapter, scaling the Italian Alps with the legend himself, Sylvester Stallone, is a dream come true. It’s going to be a great challenge and blast taking this franchise to new heights, a responsibility I don’t take lightly.”
Maybe Waugh invites Butler to be a part of this, too? Stallone’s a bit long in the tooth to carry something like this himself. Color me interested in seeing what Waugh and Stallone can get out of more Cliffhanger, but I’m not sure anyone other than us old school fans will care.
