Mel Gibson Is Set to Direct a Remake of This Classic Western

Mel Gibson’s Hollywood comeback is continuing as he will now be heavily involved in a remake of a 1960s classic western.

Gibson and Bryan Bagby were selected by Warner Bros. to write the script for an upcoming remake of “The Wild Bunch,” the hit 1969 film directed by Sam Peckinpah.

Gibson will direct the film and also serve as an executive producer.

The role marks another step for Gibson in his comeback in Hollywood. In 2006, the powers that be were not too happy that he had an anti-Semitic outburst during a DUI arrest on tape, in which he said, “F***ing Jews … the Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world.”

That outburst did not sit well with the rest of the industry — and Gibson felt the impact.

“I think he’s essentially been blacklisted in the industry,” Shane Black, director of “The Nice Guys” and “The Predator,” told Business Insider in May 2016. “I think people don’t want to work with him.”

It was not until nearly a decade after the arrest that he landed another major directing gig. Gibson, who apologized multiple times for his drunken rant, got another chance with “Hacksaw Ridge” in 2016. The film grossed $175.3 million worldwide and received six Oscar nominations and won two awards (Best Achievement in Film Editing and Best Achievement in Sound Editing).

The original “Wild Bunch” — cast member William Holden is pictured above on the right — focuses on a gang of outlaws around the United States-Mexico border as they struggle to adapt to the modernizing West in 1913. Still immensely popular to this day, the movie earned the number 52 slot on the BBC’s top-100 “greatest American films” list back in 2015.

The movie also had a profound impact on the way Americans viewed the Old West. Typically, films romanticized it and showed cowboys as heroes, but in “The Wild Bunch,” this was not the case. The outlaws were — at times — just as unethical as the villains and were deeply flawed human beings.

“The Wild Bunch” is not the only directing job Gibson has lined up. He’s working on “The Passion of the Christ: Resurrection” — a sequel to his 2004 film, which earned $611.9 million at the box office.

He has also recently starred in such mainstream pictures as “Daddy’s Home 2” and “The Expendables 3.”

Not everyone is happy with Gibson’s comeback. Leftist comedian Sarah Silverman reacted to news about “The Wild Bunch” remake on Twitter by reminding everyone of a dark period in Gibson’s life.

“F***ing Jews. The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world,” she tweeted, repeating the infamous quote from Gibson.

For more on Gibson’s latest gig, check out the video below:

Tom Joyce is a freelance writer from the South Shore of Massachusetts. He covers sports, pop culture, and politics and has contributed to The Federalist, Newsday, and other outlets.