A new Friday report by Variety‘s Patrick Frater confirms the completion Blade Of The 47 Ronin, the sequel to the original Keanu Reeves-led 2013 Universal Pictures release. Actor and filmmaker Ron Yuan (Step Up China) directs for a second venture with Tim Kwok producing, and a script by John Swetnam, Lucifer actress Aimee Garcia, and A.J. Mendez.
The film, which wrapped in Hungary this week, hails from Universal’s 1440 Productions shingle. Actress Anna Akana (Jupiter’s Legacy) stars alongside U.S. martial artist Teresa Ting and Mike Moh (Once Upon A Time In Hollywood), and Warrior actor Dustin Nguyen, along with Chris Pang, Japanese actor and model Fukuyama Chikako, action star Mark Dacascos, Luna Fujimoto, Akira Koieyama and Nino Furuhata.
As Frater notes, Blade Of The 47 Ronin is set in Budapest, 300 years following the events of the first film. It takes a more subversive turn as it brings a more female-centric narrarive into focus, where our samurai heroines “lead the campaign to reunite two halves of a mythical sword and keep it out of the hands of a villain who wants power for himself.”
The article dives into what it took to make the film a reality, originally plotting a Thailand shoot before ultimately relocating. Yuan also spoke to Frater about using the sequel as an opportunity to right a lot of wrongs that stemmed from the original film, and giving it a “facelift”:
“We need people who know the genres, people that know the history, people that can understand how to bring these stories, make it fresh and pop off the screen. Not like those old TV shows where every time there’s an Asian theme, or an Asian character, you hear the gong going ‘ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding dang’,” he told Variety. “None of that shit anymore.”
Yuan also added:
“It was important that this new samurai and Ninja culture could be opened up to different personalities, not just in the Asian world, but all over, making it more international,”
Kwok, whose credits partly include Jackie Chan’s The Medallion, and Tomasz Baginski’s upcoming live-action Saint Seiya: Knights Of The Zodiac, spoke about using Budapest to provide a dystopian cyberpunk look for the film, in addition to its more subversive anti-patriarchal message:
“This is a female-driven story, with our main group of heroes — Luna, Onami, Aya and Mai — fighting alongside Reo, who is a male Ronin (exiled Samurai), for the fulfilment of the prophecy. They are also fighting against ingrained prejudices of the other clans about female warriors,” said Kwok. “The story of strong females fighting against societal pressures and expectations is really timely.”
Lead photo: Keanu Reeves in ’47 Ronin’ for Universal Pictures
