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Action movies have been more politically correct in 2017. If you look at Chuck Norris flicks like “Delta Force” or “Invasion USA” — they would never get made today. Those movies demonize a specific culture, even though, during that time, we had a lot to fear from those cultures.

Studios are afraid to [tick off] a nation. Even the “Red Dawn” remake had to digitally remove China as the baddies and make the invaders North Korean — an accepted baddie. Russia is coming back around as an acceptable bad guy. But amazingly, Muslim radicals still make studios nervous, even though that’s the biggest threat in the world.

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It paints the studios into a corner, because how many times can you use European villains? It gets old. A lot of recent bad guys have been domestic. No one complains about that.

Q: If there’s something American moviegoing audiences love, it’s an American, red meat-eating action hero — guys like Dirty Harry, John McClane, Snake Plissken. What makes Eddie Deacon the next American action hero, and what inspired you to create him?
A: A lot of it came from my reading about these rock-star soldiers who come home from serious combat — to work in a grocery store, or a hardware store, or, in the case of “Security,” a mall.

Those are honorable jobs, but these guys were in Fallujah. Afghanistan. Syria. Dodging insurgents and IEDs. Now they’re guarding beach balls in a strip mall in Wisconsin.

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Eddie’s depressed. I never mention PTSD in the film, but it’s implied. He gets the opportunity to be a hero again, to defend someone, to win “a war.” And he inspires his inexperienced fellow security guards around him to do the same. They become his “unit.” Eddie is resurrected by the events at the mall, and this inspires him to reconnect with his estranged family. “It’s not always where you want to be, but it’s where you need to be.” That’s a line from the film.

Q: What’s next for you?
A: A lot of stuff. I’m doing a movie called “Paradise City,” which is like “Drive” meets “Taken.” Very neon-noir. Like Michael Mann. After that, I have a movie called “Red Sky,” which is basically a version of Steven Spielberg’s “Duel” on the water.

And I’m hoping to finish a more personal movie called “Vagabonds,” which I hope will be my “Good Will Hunting” — I wish.

“Security” will arrive in theaters and on demand in August.[lz_pagination]