Russo Brothers are set for yet another action-packed film for Netflix after this year’s mega-film Extraction starring Chris Hemsworth. This time, the film will be helmed by Joe Russo and Anthony Russo. Netflix has set its most ambitious film so far starring Chris Evans and Ryan Gosling in the lead roles. Titled Gray Man, the movie is based on the 2009 Mark Greaney novel about a freelance assassin and former CIA operative named Court Gentry.
It will be the most expensive film coming from Netflix set over a budget of $200 million. According to Deadline, “The action thriller is a deadly duel between killers as Gentry (Gosling) is hunted across the globe by Lloyd Hansen (Evans), a former cohort of Gentry’s at the CIA. The Gray Man turned into a bestselling book series, and the expectation is that Gosling will continue in multiple installments. The project was developed years back at New Regency as a Brad Pitt/James Gray vehicle, but it stalled. The Russos quietly have been developing it for years.”
“The movie is a real mano a mano between those two great actors who represent two different versions of the CIA, in what it can be, and what it can do,” Anthony Russo told Deadline. “For those who were fans of Captain America: Winter Soldier, this is us moving into that territory in more of a real-world setting. That’s what this movie really means for us.”
Speaking of film’s mega-scale, Joe Russo further said, “The intention is for it to be competitive with any theatrical, and the ability to do with Gosling and Evans is a dream for us. The idea is to create a franchise and build out a whole universe, with Ryan at the center of it. We have all committed to the first movie, and that’s got to be great to get us to the second movie. These are master assassins, and Gosling’s characters get burned by the CIA, and Evans’ character has to hunt him down. We have a great working relationship with Netflix, and we go back almost 20 years with Scott Stuber. We formed AGBO to be an agnostic storytelling company, where we figure out the best platform. We think Netflix is the perfect place for this film.”
Gray Man will mark the reunion of Russo Brothers and Chris Evans. They directed films for Marvel Studios including 2014’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier, 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, 2018’s Avengers: Infinity War, and 2019’s Avengers: Endgame.
Their production company AGBO will produce an ambitious project. Joe Russo penned the script, with Endgame screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely taking the final call.
