Everybody forget about the nation’s crumbling economy, the fact that “Hop” and “Alvin and the Chipmunks” director Tim Hill is bringing the beloved robot comedy “Short Circuit” back to life is cause for an outcry!
Clearly we jest, but Deadline is reporting that producers Ryan Heppe and John Hyde have approved the family-friendly director as their choice to helm this proposed “reboot” through the house of the Weinsteins’ production shingle Dimension. Apparently the original film’s producer David Wallace is also along for the ride. That film followed “The Breakfast Club” alumnus Ally Sheedy as she assisted the self-aware military experiment Number 5 in an effort to prove to his creator, played by Steve Guttenberg, that he is worthy of a real life. Naturally, the military is in hot pursuit of their robotic creation.
When we first heard about this reboot all the way back in 2009, the equally unsavory “Paul Blart: Mall Cop” director Steve Carr was onboard with a script by “Robot Chicken” scribe Dan Milano. It looks as if Milano has managed to hang around while Carr has moved on to a few surprisingly interesting-sounding projects like the star-studded comedy vignette film “Movie 43.”
Perhaps Milano can bring some wit to this reboot, but we’re kind of hoping that Dimension wears its badge of horror on this one and turns it into another technophobic robot slasher picture. Clearly that’s not going to happen, but we’re sure that Hill will deliver a (bland) family film that’ll probably make some serious bank. We’re guessing that casting news regarding the parts formerly occupied by Sheedy and Guttenberg is on the way, while Number 5 will probably just be voiced by an auto tuned Russell Brand. At the very least, we hope to see some sort of Steve Guttenberg cameo a la “Party Down.”
