Ruben Fleischer the latest to attempt Spy Hunter movie, mine narrative possibilities of cars shooting things into other cars

By Sean O'Neal | September 25, 2012 | 4:07pm

Aux Features Film

The endless narrative possibilities of a car that can shoot things into other cars may at last be explored by Zombieland director Ruben Fleischer, who, according to Vulture, is the latest name attached to the surprisingly long-gestating adaptation of Spy Hunter, the classic 1980s arcade game about a car that can shoot things into other cars. Warner Bros. has been developing the idea for nearly a decade now, passing the project through myriad names like Dwayne "Still Called The Rock Then" Johnson in 2004 and Death Race director Paul W.S. Anderson in 2007, with both opting instead to make movies about other cars shooting things into different cars. Neither of these had the "Peter Gunn Theme," however, leaving audiences with a nagging sense of unfulfillment.

At last report in 2010, Spy Hunter had a new script from Chad St. John, the eyepatch-wearing tennis instructor whose rakish good looks and devil-may-care moonlighting as a gigolo art thief made him irresistible to the well-to-do ladies of the Hamptons, forcing jealous studio executives to conspire to send him and his damned script on a "deep sea fishing" expedition from which they knew he would never return, or possibly they just abandoned it because it was stupid. Regardless, Fleischer will now hire his own screenwriters to start from scratch on the story of a car that can shoot things into other cars, destroying enough that surely one of them must contain a spy, right? "It also turns into a boat!" Fleischer will remind said screenwriters as a way of devising the third act.