It’s been a long, long await for South Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho as he sought to see his latest film, Snowpiercer, get its day in theaters around the world, including in North America. Evidently, as the film launched its success story with rave reviews from its previous releases in South Korea, Hong Kong and France, in addition to its positive test audience ratings for the director’s cut against TWC’s, the film suffered from a major snag last year as Harvey Weinstein felt it necessary to chop the film down for its U.S. audiences in southern states so it would sell better as a condensed action movie.
This obviously did not settle well with the director and it ultimately lead to a long and winding debate that kept the film’s North American release in an unnecessary state of limbo while Bong and TWC sorted out their differences, until Thursday night when Deadline reported that a deal has finally been reached for Bong to keep his two and a half-hour duration in exchange for limited theatrical release instead of a nationwide release as originally planned in 2012 when TWC acquired the rights.
Snowpiercer is based on a French graphic novel by Jacques Lob, Benjamin Legrand and Jean-Marc Rochette and tells the story of a post-apocalyptic Earth where a failed experiment to stave off global warming has forced the planet’s remaining surviving inhabitants into a global train known as the Snowpiecer, where its survivors are broken into an oppressive class system that spills into war. The news comes just a little less than two months before the film’s lead actor, Chris Evans is set to appear in Marvel’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
Snowpiercer is written by Bong and screenwriter Kelly Masters, with actor Song Kang-ho, actresses Tilda Swinton and Allison Pill, actors John Hurt, Jamie Bell, Ed Harris and Ewen Bremner, and actresses Octavia Spencer and Ah Sung-ko.
Stay tuned for more info.