After tackling effects heavy projects like James Cameron’s Alita: Battle Angel and Lucasfilm’s Star Wars series The Mandalorian/The Book of Boba Fett, director Robert Rodriguez is set to direct Ben Affleck (The Accountant, The Town) and Alice Braga (Predators, Queen of The South, City of God) in a new crime thriller called Hypnotic.

A detective (Affleck) becomes entangled in a mystery involving his missing daughter and a secret government program while investigating a string of high-end crimes.

Speaking with Collider, Robert Rodriguez has revealed that filming on Hypnotic begins in six weeks (in Austin, Texas) and has been working on the project for nearly 20 years, starting the script back in 2002. Also, comparing to the thriller to an amped-up version of a Hitchcock film, which is certainly a way to get naysayers on board to the idea of Rodriguez making something less cartoony.

“It’s like a Hitchcock thriller on steroids. That’s all I can say. As soon as you see the first trailer, you’ll go ‘I got it. I’m there.’ It’s that kind of a movie. A lot of twists, a lot of turns. Very exciting. It’s a not everything you see is real-type movie and it’s got a great cast. It’ll be very energetic. It’s one of my favorite stories. I started writing it back in 2002. So it’s one of the ones I’ve had the longest that I’ve been wanting to do. I’m very excited that we finally might be making it.”

It’ll be interesting to see him tackle something a little more grounded and mature, while an action movie, Desperado is oddly enough one of his less silly/grounded pictures. He sort of went overboard with kiddie flicks, CGI experiments, and wacky exploitation projects over the last couple of decades. So, seeing Rodriguez make something more for adult viewers and not teenage boys or kids will be fun to see come together.

He’s already wrapped on The Book of Boba Fett, his Star Wars spinoff series that will debut on Disney+ in December. We’re hearing there is a good shot that Rodriguez is returning to direct an episode of The Mandalorian for Season 3 as well.

Hypnotic is expected to see the filmmaker reunite with veteran stunt coordinator Jeff Dashnaw, who has a wave of action film credits under his belt like Once Upon A Time In Mexico, Sin City, Planet Terror, Death Proof, Inglorious Basterds, Django Unchained, The Hateful Eight, Predators, A Good Day To Die Hard, Machete Kills, Sin City: A Dame To Kill For, The Magnificent Seven, and The Equalizer 2.

At one point, Rodriguez was hired by 20th Century Studios (prior to the merger) to remake John Carpenter’s Escape From New York, but remains to be seen if that will ever happen. Interestingly enough, The Book of Boba Fett features work from Escape From New York cinematographer Dean Cundey, who worked with Carpenter on a wave of his films such as Big Trouble In Little China, The Thing, The Fog, and Halloween.

SOURCE: COLLIDER