'John Wick' Director Chad Stahelski Eyes High Concept Car Movie From 'A Quiet Place' Producers

Director Chad Stahelski has John Wick: Chapter 4 on the docket for next year, but he may have already found his next project beyond that. A new report says Stahelski is eyeing a high concept car movie at Paramount from two of the writers of Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol and the producers of both A Quiet Place movies.

Deadline reports that producers Andrew Form and Brad Fuller have a script set up at Paramount from writers André Nemec and Josh Applebaum (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Zoo, Alias), with Stahelski considering sliding into the director's chair. Plot details are still pretty scarce, but it's an action movie that is "described as a high-concept spin capturing the spirit of the great car movies, with a unique central relationship at its center."

That description will certainly rev the engines of film fans who love movies like Bullitt, Ronin, The French Connection, The Italian Job, The Fast and the Furious, Baby Driver, and Gone in Sixty Seconds. (And recency bias be damned: I'd argue that two movies which came out last year, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and Ford v Ferrari, should be granted instant membership into the pantheon of great car films.) But at the same time, the details about this film are still so vague that we could be looking at another situation akin to Getaway, the 2013 car movie starring Ethan Hawke and Selena Gomez. That film also had a high concept and a unique central relationship, and it ended up being a huge missed opportunity on practically every level: the cinematography, the script, the performances, the setting, and the direction all contributed to a final product that felt like a nonsensical made-for-TV thriller. Here's hoping the level of talent involved with this still-untitled movie means it'll be just as memorable, only on the opposite end of the quality spectrum.

Whether or not Stahelski officially commits to directing remains up in the air, but Deadline says he is already on board as a producer through his 87eleven Entertainment. That company has worked on action scenes in films like the John Wick trilogy, Birds of Prey, Atomic Blonde, Ninja Assassin, and more, and have become a go-to player in Hollywood for intense, visceral action sequences. But I'm hoping Stahelski decides to take a breather between Wick movies to exercise some car chase skills here, because he clearly has a knack for it; there isn't much room for that in the hand-to-hand combat world of the John Wick universe, but he managed to fit a nice little car-related action scene into the beginning of John Wick: Chapter 2:

Form and Fuller will produce through their Fully Formed Entertainment. (The duo used to be a part of Platinum Dunes alongside Michael Bay, but left that company and started their own a couple of years ago.) Nemec and Applebaum will also produce through their Midnight Radio production banner.