Actor, martial artist and stunt-multihyphenate Marcus Shakesheff is in the works with Keeping Secrets, a new spy thriller he’s writing and developing out of his independent Beat ‘Em Up Films production banner. The film will be his second venture into feature film production after breaking ground in 2016 with Welsh action thriller, Kamikaze.
Plot details are largely unknown but the film is being described as a modern day take on Tomas Alfredson’s 2011 adaptation of John la Carrè’s hit novel, “Tinker Tailor Solider Spy”, with an original story based on real people and events through a fictionalized lens. The production is also hinting at inspiration from other classic and contemporary hit thrillers such as the Police Story trilogy, The Raid 2, The Boune Identity, Todd Phillips’s Joker and Donnie Yen headliner, Flash Point.
I am further told that the new film aims to be much, much larger than Shakesheff’s predecessor in terms of scope and scale for its mininal budget, blending espionage drama and thrills, with high-caliber martial arts action and stunts to boot.
Catherine Maher, who wrote Kamikaze, is reteaming with Shakesheff who is penning the script, and is producing for Beat ‘Em Up Films.
Shakesheff is more than fifteen years in his profession with respective acting, stunt performance, fight choreography and stunt coordinator credits on shows like HBO’s “Game Of Thrones”, FX’s “The Bastard Executioner”, and Amazon Prime series “Hanna”, and films such as Sherlock Holmes and Sherlock Holmes 2: A Game Of Shadows, American Assassin, Wonder Woman, Nightshooters, Accident Man, The King’s Man, and upcoming Tiger Shroff actioner, Ganapath: Part 1.
Developed and produced over several years until its release, Shakesheff eventually made landfall with Kamikaze, starring and directing what would be the first-ever martial arts action movie out of Wales for his feature directing debut. Storied by Shakesheff and penned by Maher, the movie saw Shakesheff in the role of a former MI-6 agent-turned-mercenary framed for murder and forced into the fight of his life when his pregnant girlfriend is kidnapped by a corrupt diplomat. Indican Pictures picked the film up for U.S. release in December 2016.
After the successful release of Kamikaze, Shakesheff took some time to focus on his career and building up his YouTube channel, MarcusMonkey, with several interesting action and comedy shorts. A few years later, he and his team over at Beat ‘Em Up began sifting through some ideas for their second feature, with the team settling on Keeping Secrets just last year.
Keeping Secrets will also reunite Shakesheff with Kamizake co-star Aaron “Ginger Ninja” Gassor (Eliminators, The Take Down, “Pennyworth”) in a stunt and performance capacity. Apart from this, and with the film still in early stages of development with casting and crewing, it is not yet known if Shakesheff will direct. One thing is certain, according to Shakesheff in a statement to Film Combat Syndicate over the weekend.
“A lot of independent action movies usually tend to include a lot of fight scenes, in my view. This is so much more bigger than that.” says Shakesheff.
“With the experience I’ve gained up to now and after ‘Kamikaze’, I can do a lot more than just fights, and so I feel like have an advantage. Even though we will be working on a low budget, I do feel I’m competing with the likes of Tom Cruise this time around.” he adds. “So, believe me, I can do so much more. This will be more.”
Production is looking at multiple locations in Wales, as well as Los Angeles and in South Africa with plans to roll cameras in Q4 2022 or early next year. In the meantime, Shakesheff is inviting any and all interested to follow the film’s progress on Instagram.