warrior’s gate
Sienna Guillory And Dave Bautista Head To WARRIOR'S GATE
Cockneys V Zombies helmer Matthias Hoene‘s latest China/French co-production, Warrior’s Gate is currently underway with filming as of last Monday. The production was announced a few years ago as part of a newly announced production partnership between Luc Besson and Mark Gao representing EuropaCorp and Fundemental Films, respectively and now that cameras are rolling with three names already cast, more have been added to the roster.
Variety reports that Resident Evil franchise and Eragon co-star, actress Sienna Guillory and The Man With The Iron Fists and recently-cast Kickboxer remake co-star Dave Bautista will join lead actor Uriah Shelton in the film which centers on a young boy who magically travels back in time to ancient China where he learns to use his videogame skills to ultimately become a Kung Fu warrior. I’m sure there’s more to this gist of a plot as its early days with cameras rolling but this does read a lot like a cross between The Forbidden Kingdom and Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, and I like both titles too. I’m not yet sure how I feel about this, but this might turn out to be more original than predicted, so I’ll probably take interest anyway. We’ll see.
Actor Mark Chao and actress Ni Ni round out the current cast with filming expected to move to Canada later on. In the meantime, filmgoers can expect to catch Guillory in Ilyas Kaduji’s Abduct and Ben Wheatley’s High Rise, while Bautista makes way for Martin Owen’s horror romp, L.A. Slasher, Scott Mann’s Bus 657 and Sam Mendes’s latest 007 installment, Spectre, all later this year.
Besson And Hoene Head For WARRIOR'S GATE Next Month!
Within the last few years following Luc Besson’s co-production partnering of EuropaCorp with Shanghai-based Fundemental Films for a slate of English-language films, its package also included a fantasy martial arts film titled Warrior’s Gate. Scant info has been granted for the latter, but thankfully things are about to change as production finally begins next month in lieu of current events at this year’s Beijing International Film Festival.
THR reports that helmer Matthias Hoene is directing this, his second feature since winning acclaim with the 2012 action horror romp, Cockneys Vs Zombies. Rising star Uriah Shelton, Flowers Of War actress Ni Ni and Taiwanese-Canadian actor Mark Chao (Black And White 1 & 2) are joining the $48 million dollar French-Chinese co-production with a script by Besson and Robert Mark Karmen which centers on teenager who gets magically transported to China where he ultimately trains in kung fu in order to save a princess from danger.
Sure, it’s a plot that sounds awfully familiar for anyone who still feels like The Forbidden Kingdom and Warriors Of Virtue just came out yesterday. Hopefully there’s some redeeming value in this project as new as it is, and who would say no to another kung fu movie at that? I wouldn’t.
Check back for more info.
H/T: City On Fire
Photo: Facebook
EuropaCorp, Fundemental Team Up For Besson's Next, WARRIOR'S GATE
Things seem to be cooking for a while now for Luc Besson and his production company Europacorp going into 2014 with a few films releasing this year, including Brick Mansions and the August release of Besson‘s newly completed sci-fi action thriller, Lucy, featuring Scarlett Johansson. The company has also been busy formulating its partnership with Mark Gao Jingdong over at Shanghai-based film production and sales company Fundemental Films, with plans to produce and release a batch of new films, notably including the new Transporter trilogy with actor Ed Skrein that was announced in the summer of last year.
The subject of such a partnership came up in an article written as recently as nearly two weeks ago in which Clifford Coonan over at The Hollywood Reporter discussed co-production status as a means for overseas film productions to get access to the mainland and make more money without being hindered by China’s current film quota system, a system which Youku Tudou Inc. chief executive Victor Koo says would increase if more theaters were built.
On the film front, the same THR report also officially confirmed another film on the way to be co-produced by both parties in the form of a new action adventure film titled Warrior’s Gate. At the time, the story details were still unknown, but a follow-up report now concludes the plot to center on a young gamer who comes across an antique box that throws him back in time to ancient China where he eventually learns martial arts.
Sure, it sounds like we’ve already been there before and the plot sounds pretty simple as things stand, so more details will be needed in the long run to get a better analysis of what this film will look like. Meanwhile, Besson will be teaming up once more with fellow scribe Robert Mark Kamen to help bring the story to life from ink to film.
We’ll learn more about this film as the year rolls on. So stick around for further updates.
Photo: Stumped Magazine
H/T: Filmbiz Asia