Writer and director Lu Yang‘s summer 2014 period actioner, Brotherhood Of Blades, didn’t exactly get a lot of press leading up to its theatrical release. Fortunately, the film did manage to muster some critical and commerical acclaim, and thankfully, that won’t be all we hear.
John Woo cohort Terence Chang produced the film along with Wang Donghui, Ling Hong, with a script co-written by Chen Shu set in seventeenth-century China where three sworn brothers-imperial soldiers Lu, Shen Lian, and Yichuan who are tasked by their new Emperor to hunt down an allegedly corrupt eunich, only to find themselves at the center of an unyielding conspiracy with danger at every turn. Chang Chen, Cecilia Liu, Qing Ye and Nie Yuan led the cast with Sang Lin (Red Cliff 1 and 2) directing the action of which some you can catch in the film’s latter-released promotional spots, and naturally, you probably would not have guessed that there would be more to the story involving this particular product.
As it turns out though, the result is much more to the contrary thanks to an update forwarded from Chinese media by Film Business Asia that the director will be returning to the chair with producing partner Zhang Ning for a prequel with a bigger budget and the possibility of all three male leads to reprise their roles. Pre-production is now underway with reason to be optimistic for a trilogy should the second fare equally well or better this time around. Meanwhile, Brotherhood Of Blades is currently available for pre-order at Amazon (H/T: City On Fire) courtesy of Well Go USA before its release in February next year.
Watch for more news ahead!