The Crow Reboot Gets A New Director - But Loses Luke Evans?

Corin Hardy has been named as the new director of Relativity Studios’ reboot of ‘The Crow,’ set to shoot in spring 2015 - but it has also come to light that the attached lead actor Luke Evans may have dropped out.

For some time, the director attached to the long in development revival of the 1994 supernatural comic book adaptation was F. Javier Gutiérrez (‘Before the Fall’), who quit the project in favour of directing the next installment in ‘The Ring’ series.

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Though the director is something of an unknown at present, ‘The Crow’ will be Corin Hardy’s second feature film following the as-yet unreleased ‘The Hallow,’ and prior to this he has directed short films and music videos for artists including The Prodigy, Biffy Clyro and Keane.

This is not such a different pedigree as that which director Alex Proyas brought to the 1994 original; he too was a music video and short film veteran, with only one feature under his belt.

Deadline (who broke the news) also mention that Hardy has “a bit of cred” for having landed the job at least in part on the recommendation of Edgar Wright, who reportedly suggested him to producer Edward R Pressman.

Hardy himself has already taken to Twitter to express his excitement at landing the job, and implied a personal investment in the source material:

Unfortunately, it would seem that one person rather less excited about it all is Luke Evans…

This new take on ‘The Crow’ has notoriously gone through a number of potential leading men, including Bradley Cooper and Mark Wahlberg, until Evans (‘The Hobbit,’ ‘Dracula Untold’) was settled on.

But now, the actor tells Den of Geek US he’s not sure if he will be donning the black PVC and face paint after all:

"No, at the minute ‘The Crow’ is not [progressing], not for me, I think it’s a little… I mean I’m sure it’s going to go ahead at some point, but I have other projects that are greenlit and ready to go and projects that I’m very interested in and you know, I can’t wait much longer! [laughs]"

It’s not inconceivable that Hardy coming on board might mean things start to move at a pace that allows for Evans to stay with the film - but at the same time, we wouldn’t be surprised if new contenders for the role start surfacing soon.

Infamous for the accidental death of leading man Brandon Lee during production, ‘The Crow’ became an instant cult classic in the mid-1990s, spawning a number of increasingly sub-par sequels and a short-lived TV spin-off.

Early word is that this new take, rather than strictly remaking the 1994 film, will play a lot closer to James O’Barr’s original graphic novel (itself inspired by a real-life tragedy, O’Barr having written and illustrated the tale to help him deal with the death of his girlfriend at the hands of a drunk driver).

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Picture Credit: Edward R Pressman Film, Universal, Caliber Press