Philip Glenister has said he'd be willing to don his old camel coat again to play DCI Gene Hunt in a movie version of ‘Life on Mars’. The popular series, which ran on the BBC from 2006-2007, also spawned sequel ‘Ashes to Ashes’, but the actor says he’s spoken to co-star John Simm about a big screen version.

Phillip GlenisterPhilip Glenister would like to see a ‘Life on Mars’ movie.

“Oh, yeah, I’d do it. Yeah, you bet,” he told the Radio Times. “John and I were talking about it a while ago and I think he’d be up for it. Maybe to do a ‘Life on Mars’ movie in some form, if we could find an angle – I think we’d be up for that, for sure.”

The series was a big hit on the BBC with fans and critics and Glenister’s politically incorrect Hunt even became an unlikely sex symbol. But thanks to it’s odd premise, a police officer from 2006 finding himself back in 1973, Glenister says even the show’s director was unsure if it would be a hit.

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“The only thing I remember from back then was the director saying, ‘I don’t know what we’re making here. This is either going to go one of two ways: it is either going to be a smash hit, or it is going to die on its arse, and we’ll never work again,’” he told The Express.

The actor also said he’s not sure if the show would get made today. “I think Gene Hunt was an unacceptable character then,” he added. “I don’t know now that the powers that be would risk such things. It would be a shame.”

Glenister is currently starring in upcoming US drama ‘Outcast’ as country preacher Reverend Anderson. The series follows Kyle Barnen (Patrick Fugit) a young man who has been plagued by demonic possession all his life, who embarks on a journey of discover with the Reverend to find answers and cure himself.