The first teaser for the latest Gerard Butler/Rick Roman Waugh team-up, Kandahar, has landed, and it doesn't look too bad. If you haven't seen it yet you can check it out below.
So it appears there are two movies coming out in May that are about driving really fast. Only this one looks to have some sort of plot, as well as a serious sense of urgency. And Kandahar's trailer does at least leave a little to the imagination, instead of putting the whole movie into an almost four minute trailer.
Gerard Butler plays Tom Harris, a CIA operative working in the middle east to counter Iran's attempts to develop a nuclear programme. But when his identity is compromised, Tom and his as yet unnamed translator (Navid Negahban) become the targets of a massive manhunt involving the Iranian military and other interested parties. The pair's only hope is to fight their way to an extraction 400 miles away in Kandahar. Hardly your average road trip.
Not only do they like working together, Butler and Waugh clearly like making chase movies together. Who doesn't like a road trip movie? Greenland was a surprisingly tense 'race against time' in which a family try to outrun an extinction level event. One of the big selling points of which was seeing Butler play more of a regular family man than his usual action hero. And Angel Has Fallen was at the very least a new direction and maybe even a return to form for the 'Has Fallen' franchise after the way too over the top London Has Fallen. All of which bodes well for this latest collaboration.
The story is inspired by writer Mitchell LaFortune's experiences working for the Defense Intelligence Agency in Afghanistan during the time of the Edward Snowden leaks. Although it's unclear how historically accurate the movie is - probably not very. Nevertheless it's a good premise for an action movie. Plenty of opportunities for gunfights and car chases! Cue big explosions in the desert.
Not that this is the only story of a guy and his translator in the desert. The trailer reminded me of another movie due out this year; Guy Ritchie's The Covenant. In fact, these two have the potential to become the Armageddon/Deep Impact of 2023. This one sees Jake Gyllenhaal's special forces soldier heading back into Afghanistan to extract the translator (Dar Salim) who saved his life. Cue more big explosions in the desert!
Speaking of action and explosions, it all looks very exciting. There's a chance that this will be pretty much non-stop action from start to finish. It certainly looks like Waugh has tried to do as much of it for real as possible. Exactly the kind of thing you'd expect of an action movie, not to mention a Butler/Waugh collaboration. So at the very least, this should be some good old fashioned 'turn your brain off' fun. But Kandahar does have the potential to be something more.
All of which rests on one big question; will Butler be falling back into his intense tough guy action hero performance, or will he follow in his Greenland footsteps and play it a bit more down to Earth? I'm hoping the presence of Navid Negahban (Homeland's 'Abu Nazir') as Harris' translator leads him more towards the latter.
Kandahar could simply be a good popcorn movie, or an intense, action-packed story of survival. Either way, it should be fun.
What did you think of the Kandahar teaser? Leave a comment below or find us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. You can also email us at moviemoustache@gmail.com.
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