Jack Harlow and Sinqua Walls hit the court in White Men Can’t Jump first look
House Party's Charles Kidd II directs the remake of the 1992 comedy with a script from Kenya Barris
Film News Jack Harlow
30 years ago, cinema asked a question: Can white men jump? 1992's White Men Can’t Jump seemed to provide a sensible answer (re: some white men can’t jump, but Woody Harrelson sure can), but as is the scientific way, one test isn’t always enough. It may have taken Hollywood a second, but the investigation continues in our first look at 20th Century Studios’ remake of White Men Can’t Jump with rapper Jack Harlow testing out the theory this time around.
Stepping into the shoes of Woody Harrelson and Wesley Snipes from the original, White Men Can’t Jump stars Harlow and Friday Night Lights’ Sinqua Walls as two streetball rivals who begin working together in order to hustle other players for money. Like Harrelson in the 1992 film, Harlow’s character uses his slightly goofy appearance to trick players into thinking he’d be easy to beat, but surprise: he indeed can jump.
“I’m like the P.T. Anderson of basketball psychological warfare,” claims Harlow in the teaser, sparking an age-old Letterboxd-centric debate with Walls over who the greatest living director is. While Walls stands behind his number one pick Spike Lee, Harlow counters back, “Spike Lee’s not even a good Knicks fan.”
Alongside Walls and Harlow, the cast includes Lance Reddick (John Wick), Teyana Taylor (Coming 2 America), Laura Harrier (BlacKkKlansman), Vince Staples (Abbott Elementary), Myles Bullock (BMF), and Tamera “Tee” Kissen.
Directing the film is Charles Kidd II aka Calmatic, who recently helmed the House Party remake and worked on Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road” music video. Kenya Barris (Black-ish) is behind the reboot’s script, adding another screenplay to his long-running list which includes 2020's The Witches, You People, and Coming 2 America.
White Men Can’t Jump will be Harlow’s debut film role, with the “First Class” rapper just coming off of a Grammy nomination for Best Rap Album for Come Home The Kids Miss You. Alongside television roles in Teen Wolf and Power, Walls recently starred in the horror film Nanny, which went on to win the Grand Jury Prize at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival.
Get ready for some basketball hustling (again) when White Men Can’t Jump hits Hulu on May 19.
20 Comments
Add another to the long list of remakes/reboots no one asked for. At least it’s only on Hulu, so it will disappear into relative obscurity pretty quickly.
Was this really a remake we needed? But still, it could be good I suppose.
To the reboot complainers, it’s been over 30 years.In that time we’ve had: 9 films with Batman with 6 different actors (two of them based on the same Batman story barely a decade apart) and at least 4 animated series.And, 8 Spider-Man films with 3 different actors including two origin stories. And at least 4 animated series as well. I think people can handle a one remake of a 30 year old film if they can handle that.
But Batman and Spider-Man are characters. None of those movies have told the same story twice; even the origin movies mixed it up. There’s a world of difference between making lots of movies about established characters with years of stories to pull from vs. remaking one single movie that told one single story.
The fuck is out here making you think we’ve handled that other shit? It’s not like we’ve been given a choice.
Batman has over 900 comics plus decades of live action TV and animation to draw from, with hundreds of characters to play.If this was a single movie remake it would be interesting. Sad news is that streaming services are rebooting, sequeling or spinning off pretty much everything from the 80s and 90s. This remake exists not because it was a good idea, but because doing shot-for-shot remakes of 90s movies is popular right now.
Maybe it will be as vital and entertaining as that House Party reboot! Double Feature!!
No, that is being coupled with a remake of Pootie Tang. Or Vampire in Brooklyn, I can’t remember.
I’ll wait for the ‘Money Train’ remake.
I wait for the money pit remake
yeah i’ll watch this garbage
Kenya Barris sucks, right?I liked Blackish, but every movie he’s written has been terrible.
I was literally going to say, Kenya doesn’t seem to have a strong track record outside of Black-ish…but maybe that’s just my viewpoint.
holy shit this is going to be bad.
The original made me like Rosie Perez, at least for two hours. Not so optimistic here.I do look forward to the takes that first Harlow thinks he can rap, now he thinks he can play basketball. What’s next?? (I’ll let you guys handle that one)
“I’m like the P.T. Anderson of basketball psychological warfare” This movie is going to suck.
you’d know about sucking