I love Rodriguez’s films, especially his El Mariachi trilogy, but the on again/off again nature of Rodriguez and McGowan’s relationship spells doom. If you don’t know their back story, let me give you a quick breakdown. The two met while filming Rodriguez’s Planet Terror, his part in the flop Grindhouse. The two started having an affair on set, which ended his 16 year marriage to Elizabeth Avellan, the mother of his five children and the producer of many of his films. Since then Rodriguez has been shopping a series of films to star his new muse, including Red Sonja, a remake of Barbarella and Woman in Chains! The only problem is numerous news outlets reported last month that McGowan had ended her engagement with the director. (link)Now from all the SDCC reports I’ve read the two were overly friendly with each other, to the point of many referring to them as being romantic during their promotion of the movie. While the two evidently said all of the right things while at the Con, this doesn’t put my mind at ease for the success of Red Sonja. If their engagement really is over I just don’t see how this movie can be successfully made, especially if the media turns on either one of them for the drama their affair created.
It is too bad all of Rodriguez’s creative energies have gone into finding movie vehicles for McGowan, because the director is such an amazing filmmaker that he doesn’t need the hype surrounding their relationship overshadowing his work and he definitely doesn’t need her to make a successful movie. Secretly I hope Red Sonja is good, if nothing else because both of their careers need a hit badly after Planet Terror.
The original Red Sonja film by director Richard Fleischer debuted in 1985 and stared Brigitte Nielsen as Red Sonja and Arnold Schwarzenegger as Kalidor.