FruitChan Tagged Articles at Cinematical

In the latest example of the bromide that film crosses international borders, we have news from Variety of an American remake of a Japanese film to be directed by a Chinese filmmaker featuring a cast of American and Canadian actors. (Pardon me, but my head is still spinning.) Let's start with the cast, which includes a couple of names that may be familiar: Henry Thomas (E.T. The Extra Terrestrial, Legends of the Fall) and Kevin Corrigan (The Departed, American Gangster) will star in Don't Look Up, the story of a film crew that slowly goes insane "when spirits from another era invade the film stock of the contempo production." Fruit Chan is set to direct.

Hideo Nakata directed the original film (Joyû-rei, AKA Ghost Actress), which was released in Japan in 1996. Two years later, Nakata made Ringu, which kicked off an Asian ghost movie boom that slackened only recently. In turn, the Hollywood remake of Ringu (The Ring) reaped big returns at the box office, which sparked the Asian remake mania we're still suffering from. Among other projects, Nakata remade his own sequel for Hollywood (The Ring Two) -- and then promptly retreated to Japan. He turned down offers from production company Distant Horizons to remake Don't Look Up himself.

There is another Bruce Lee film in the works, one that is a bit more manageable in scope than the utterly ginormous 40-part series I told you about in April. The CBC is reporting that Fruit Chan, the Chinese filmmaker responsible for flicks like Made in Hong Kong and Durian Durian, is going to head the biopic, titled Kowloon City. The film already has a pretty big production name behind it -- Terence Chang, the producer of films like Face/Off, Mission: Impossible II and Bulletproof Monk. Set in Hong Kong in the 1950's, the movie will feature Lee as a child, after his family moved back to China from San Francisco. It's looking to be sort of a buddy drama, as the film will focus not only on Lee, but a fellow kung fu student. How far this film will follow the boys is yet to be determined.

If you want more than tiny tyke Lee action, this isn't the only feature in the works (besides the huge series). On the biographical side of things, Hong Kong helmer Stanley Kwan is trying to negotiate with Lee's family to detail how the action star was influenced by the absence of his father. On the fictional side of things, Enter the Dragon is getting remade. With all these in the works, I wouldn't be surprised if we get something about Bruce Lee's later life, if you can call 33 "later," soon enough.