Sylvester Stallone Is Making a New ‘Cliffhanger’

Having already brought back Rocky Balboa and John Rambo at least a couple of times in his senior years, Sylvester Stallone will now resurrect yet another one of his signature movies from the past. According to reports, Stallone has agreed to star in a “reboot” of Cliffhanger, the 1993 action thriller in which he appeared as mountain climber Gabe Walker, who winds up in a life-or-death struggle with a group of crooks led by the menacing John Lithgow.

The original Cliffhanger was basically Die Hard at high altitude, with some spectacular mountaineering footage from director Renny Harlin. Buoyed by the intense mountain climbing scenes, the movie wound up being one of Stallone’s bigger hits in the ’90s, grossing over $250 million worldwide.

Variety now says that Stallone will return to play Walker again in a new take on the material directed by Ric Roman Waugh, whose recent work includes Greenland and Angel Has Fallen. Supposedly the new version is less of a Stallone vehicle and more of an ensemble, with “casting currently underway for a lead to headline.” (Stallone is now 76, so headlining a mountain climbing action movie might be a bit of a tall ask.)

This is not the first time a new Cliffhanger has been proposed. In 2019, a female-led reboot of the concept was pitched around the Cannes marketplace. (I guess no one was buying.) Five years before that, yet another Cliffhanger reboot was proposed. That one also went nowhere.

Neither of those had Stallone, though. Perhaps his presence means this Cliffhanger will finally get off the ground. (Elevation jokes! Terrific.)