As we anxiously count down the days and hours until the release of The Raid 2: Berandal, director Gareth Evans has revealed to Crave Online that the third and final part of the trilogy won’t be made for at least two or three years.
“I’m not touching The Raid 3 for a couple of years from now. I don’t have any plans to do The Raid 3 within the next two or three years so I’m going to take a break from that franchise for a bit. I want to do some things outside of Indonesia for like two films, then come back to Indonesia and shoot The Raid 3.”
On the upside there is a silver lining, one of the projects Evans is developing will see him reunite with Iko Uwais for what sounds like a challenging role even for his array of skills.
“I have another one I want to shoot with him first. Still in the action genre and it’s something that he needs to train for for a fair amount of time. You have to make good with some weaponry, my friend.”
In between the first and second Raid films Gareth Evans found time to co-direct Safe Haven with Timo Tjahjanto, a section in the anthology horror movie sequel VHS 2 which was released last year. This showed a very different side to Gareth Evans’ talents as a filmmaker and proved he could flip seamlessly from genre to genre. Next up Evans is producing Timo’s next movie The Night Comes for Us before he tackles his next directorial venture.
The US remake of The Raid recently hired Patrick Hughes (Expendables 3) to direct and Out Of The Furnace scriber Brad Ingelsby is currently drafting the script. Crave Online quizzed Evans on his thoughts on the remake.
“I think what worked for me was the fact that nobody questioned what I wanted to do on that, the same way I don’t think anyone should question what Patrick wants to do on that. For me, in order for that film to work really well, they’ve got to let him go off into his sandbox, play around and see what he comes up with. When they suggested Patrick, I had no problem at all because he’s a super talented director. Red Hill, f******* great film. Such a great movie.”
The Raid 2: Berandal hits cinemas April 11.