20th Century Studios Plans ‘Enemy Mine’ Remake

(L to R) Dennis Quaid and Louis Gossett Jr. in ‘Enemy Mine’. Photo: 20th Century Fox.

Preview:

‘Star Trek: Picard’ showrunner Terry Matalas will write an ‘Enemy Mine’ remake.
It’ll adapt the 1985 cult sci-fi movie.
No director is attached yet.

Such was the impact of his work on ‘Star Trek: Picard’ (where he joined as a writer in Season 2 and then took Season 3, the last hurrah for the show, to new heights as showrunner) that Terry Matalas is a man very much in demand.

Just last month, we learned that Matalas had been hired to oversee the new Marvel series spun off from ‘WandaVision’, which will follow the continuing adventures of Paul Bettany’s android character.

And that’s not all. Now, via The Hollywood Reporter, we know that he’ll also be working for another arm of Disney –– 20th Century Studios, which has put a remake of ‘Enemy Mine’ into development, with Matalas on script duty.

“Enemies because they were taught to be. Allies because they had to be. Brothers because they dared to be.”

PG-131 hr 48 minDec 20th, 1985

What’s the story of ‘Enemy Mine’?

(L to R) Dennis Quaid and Louis Gossett Jr. in ‘Enemy Mine’. Photo: 20th Century Fox.

With mankind locked in desperate combat against a reptilian alien species, ‘Enemy Mine’ sees Dennis Quaid’s human pilot Davidge and Louis Gossett Jr.’s opposite number Drac crash landing on a desolate planet.

Both have deep-seated hatred for one another but are forced to overcome their prejudices to survive. Things are taken up a notch when the human pilot must take care of the alien’s baby when the reptilian is no longer able.

The original movie was based on a novella by the sci-fi author Barry B. Longyear. The novella was originally published in Isaac Asimov’s ‘Science Fiction’ magazine in 1979, winning the Nebula Award that year for best novella. It was followed by two sequels and eventually published as a trilogy titled ‘The Enemy Papers’.

So if the new take on ‘Enemy Mine’ does well, you can expect Disney, never a company to let a franchise opportunity to go unexplored, to order at least one sequel.

Who made the original ‘Enemy Mine’?

(L to R) Dennis Quaid and Louis Gossett Jr. in ‘Enemy Mine’. Photo: 20th Century Fox.

Working from a script by Ed Khmara, German filmmaker Wolfgang Petersen made his English-language debut with the movie, taking it over after 20th Century Fox fired original director Richard Loncraine during production.

The clash, which necessitated reshooting the film, ballooned the budget, with more woe coming when the movie crash landed at the box office.

Since then, however, it has been re-evaluated as a cult movie, which goes some way to explain why it has been targeted for a remake. With any luck, the new film will have less of a chaotic production process.

Who is making the new ‘Enemy Mine’?

Jonathan Frakes as Riker and Patrick Stewart as Picard on the Paramount+ original series 'Star Trek: Picard.'

So far, Matalas is the only person on the creative side hired to work on the movie, no director or producer is so far attached. 20th Century Studios boss Steve Asbell is overseeing development.

Since it is at a very early stage in the process, the new ‘Enemy Mine’ does not yet have a release date.