Pleeeeeease tell me she’s up for the Kiefer Sutherland role. “Today’s a good day to die.”
Niels Arden Oplev is directing a remake of Joel Schumacher’s FLATLINERS, and Ellen Page is in talks to star.
If you’ve never seen the 1990 original, it featured a crazy cast of then-young stars/starlets (Sutherland, Julia Roberts, Kevin Bacon, William Baldwin, and Oliver Platt) as young doctors who take turns flatlining their heart rate to get a short glimpse of “the other side.” It’s got all the visual flourish you could hope for from circa-1990 Schumacher, which helps add a little flavor to the increasingly silly premise (which ends up focusing on an unrelated childhood drama for some reason).
Sutherland played the mad genius role, the guy undeterred by the increasing warning signs of his endeavor who continually pushes his comrades further and further towards the edge. Page played a similar role in THE EAST, and would be terrific as she pontificates madly about the afterlife while disregarding the safety of her friends. Roberts’ part wasn’t nearly as interesting, so I hope both that Page is up for another character and that there will be more than one female member of the group this time around (some color wouldn’t hurt neither).
FLATLINERS seems even less ripe for a remake than 1990 jams like ARACHNOPHOBIA or DARKMAN, and despite the still-impressive cast, I’m not sure a lot of folks even remember/know about the original film. Still, this would fall under the category of remakes to films that didn’t fully realize the potential of their premise, and there’s a ton that could be done with the idea of med students voraciously researching what happens when you die. Arden Oplev is an underrated talent who didn’t get the credit he deserved for either DEAD MAN DOWN or the MR. ROBOT pilot, and he’s an ace at crafting stories that feel bigger, realer, and deeper than they probably would in the hands of another. If he can inject this film with the existential fascination and moody intensity that the first film merely broached, then this could potentially eclipse the memory of the original film like THE MALTESE FALCON or SCARFACE.
Now, let’s see who he gets to play Page’s fellow doctors-in-training.
