The view that Hollywood has been cynically reliant on adaptations, remakes and retellings of prior intellectual properties (IP) in recent decade is not without merit, and to a certain extent I agree with this. But some time ago I finally decided to watch John Woo's Face/Off (1997), and I've come away from it feeling that this action flicks is ripe for a television series adaptation.
Don't get me wrong. I can't even say I enjoyed the movie. It's just...ok, despite the critical accolades and financial success it picked up over two decades ago, I suppose? Maybe I would have enjoyed it more had I watched it when it first came out. It's a balls-out, bonkers action movie, but I could never be sure whether the action sequences were played out straight or ironically.
Anyway, I'm not saying that Face/Off needs a TV remake because the movie is good. No, it's actually because there are several acts of the movie lends itself well to being retold as a thriller series.
As a brief recap, the plot revolves around arch nemeses FBI agent Sean Archer and sociopathic career criminal Castor Troy, who swap their faces using a high-tech transplant. Nicholas Cage plays Troy and Archer-as-Troy, while John Travolta stars as Archer and Troy-as-Archer.
A part of the first act has Archer-as-Troy disguising himself as a prison convict in order to trick Troy's brother and lackey Pollux into giving up information on an imminent bombing attack. Unfortunately I don't remember much about the plot points (I didn't enjoy the movie that much, mind you), but I recall that Archer had to utilise subterfuge in order to trick Pollux into revealing the locations of the bomb. Furthermore, I found the whole prison sequence to be a little short; he was in there for what felt like only days, when I feel realistically it should have taken him weeks or months.
The second act is also ripe for adaptation. While Archer manages to leave the prison, Troy-as-Archer also succeeds in infiltrating Archer's work and family lives, which means more deceitful shenanigans. Troy still has to work to allay Archer's wife Eve's aspersions, while winning over his superior in order to maintain his after-hours criminal activities. And at the same time, Archer is trying to return to his family and somehow convince Eve that he is the real thing, while having the appearance of her husband's mortal enemy.
I think there is also another plotline from the movie that is fit for adaptation as part of a thriller series, but for the life of me I can't recall it any longer, and I have no plan to rewatch it.
Extend the prison sequences into one season, the movie's second act into the next two, then add the plotline which I've forgotten, and boom, you've got a four-ten-episode-season Amazon Prime thriller series. If they were able to stretch The Hobbit into three movies and The Handmaid's Tale into five seasons (so far), why not Face/Off? God, I hate Elizabeth Moss's stupid face so, so much.
I'll take my proposer's fee in the form of Mars colony shares, Bezos!
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