We can now proudly say we know a third thing, as Variety reports that Russell Crowe will also star in the film, taking on a mentor role to Cavill’s character. That drops Crowe into the same position that Sean Connery occupied in the original Highlander, where he played an Egyptian immortal who was, for some reason, played by Sean Connery. (French-American Christopher Lambert, meanwhile, portrayed heroic Scot Connor MacLeod, who discovers he can only die via convoluted circumstances that involve having a lightning-heavy sword fight while listening to Queen.)
Crowe’s spent the last few years operating at different depths in a thick soup of cinematic cheese, having recently tossed himself into multiple exorcism movies, and appeared as the Bad Dad in Kraven The Hunter, a movie we were genuinely shocked to remember actually came out in theaters. Still, we can absolutely see him chewing happily on this role: Bossing Cavill around, delivering one-liners, and then, inevitably, getting his head chopped off by whoever ends up playing the film’s villain. (Clancy Brown memorably took the job in the original; given Brown’s appearance in Stahelski’s John Wick: Chapter 4, we’re holding out hope for a cameo in the new one.)
Honestly, the big question facing Highlander is less one of casting, than of seeing what Stahelski can do outside the film franchise that took him from “well-respected stunt performer” to “world’s premier action director.” That’s a much bigger reputation to live up to than any traces of lingering Highlander fandom still kicking around in the back of the brains of fans of the original cult hit, or even the TV show—but also has us genuinely excited to see what he, Cavill, and Crowe can cook up together.
