My theory is that if a studio is afraid to screen the film for critics then the film is not good enough to be released, let alone made into a franchise. Lionsgate proved this with Saw and is aiming to now do the same thing with Crank. Empire is now reporting that the adrenaline junky Chev Chelios will be returning to the big screen with Jason Statham set to reprise the character in a Crank 2.
Crank co-directors Brian Taylor and Mark Neveldine told the site the plan is to begin shooting April 25, 2008, and “will pick up exactly where Crank one ends.”
Neveldine told the site, “We’re finding that a lot of people were thinking, ‘Oh, Crank 2 can’t be done’, but we came up with an idea, we wrote the script, and after the studio read it they couldn’t believe that we pulled it off. And of course, the best test was giving it to Jason and Jason turned down every other project so he could do this, start this in the spring of next year. He was so excited, he couldn’t believe it.”
“It’s going to be more sexual, more violent – more of everything,” Taylor told Empire. “We realize with a movie like Crank, you can’t do a sequel and do 60% or 70% of what the original was. You have to go twice as hard. So that’s what we’re going to do. If we’re going to live up to the first one with the sequel – we’re taking it WAY past the point of the first one.”
Now, I have not seen Crank so my statement above was just a generalization. I just added it to my Netflix queue so I will reserve any judgment on the idea of a franchise until I have watched the first film, which I have heard leaves virtually no room for a sequel. I will say that Taylor’s comment with regard to having to go “twice as hard” on a sequel is all wrong and is pretty much what causes sequels to suck. Changing what made people like the first one by making it more violent, more sexual, more everything does not help if the story sucks. Hostel 2 and Saw 3 are prime examples.
I will say, the one thing I like about Crank – even though I never saw the film – was the “Fuck Montage” I made out of an MP3 the studio sent out. That was a fun one to make and watch.
