Liam Neeson to lead Retribution, a remake of a Speed-like Spanish thriller

Last Updated on July 31, 2021

Never one to shy away from a thriller, we've received word that actor Liam Neeson has signed on to star in RETRIBUTION, a remake of the Spanish film EL DESCONOCIDO. As of the moment, Studiocanal is making preparations for the film to begin shooting in a co-production with The Picture Company and Ombra Films. Andrew Rona and Alex Heineman will produce courtesy of The Picture Company’s overall StudioCanal deal, with Jaume Collet-Sera and his Ombra Films partner, Juan Sola. Vaca Films, which made the original film, will act as the project's executive producers in conjuntion with Atresmedia Cine. RETRIBUTION will officially be the fourth time that Neeson has teamed with the producers of Studiocanal after collaborating on such Collet-Serra directed films as UNKNOWN, NON-STOP, and THE COMMUTER.

Written by Chris Salmanpour and Andrew Baldwin, RETRIBUTION will follow a well-to-do Wall Street executive who discovers on his way to work that a bomb has been planted in his car by an unknown assailant. He is forced to follow a series of orders throughout the day or else the bomb will be detonated. The situation is more dire because the man’s family is in the car with him. 

In several instances, EL DESCONOCIDO has been compared to Jan de Bont's 1994 action thriller SPEED starring Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock. It's funny, because that's exactly what I thought when I was first researching the movie for the sake of this article. I don't know about you, but I'm willing to give RETRIBUTION a go. I might not catch it in theaters, but the premise sounds ridiculous enough that I could maybe introduce watching it when my mother-in-law comes to visit – she's a huge action movie buff. 

Liam Neeson's next feature for StudioCanal will be THE COMMUTER, which is scheduled for a January 12, 2018 release.