Hey Folks, Harry here... for quite some time, Thomas Tull and the LEGENDARY Rascals have been trying to put together an enormous undertaking. THE GREAT WALL. The film is an attempt at truly epic cinema, they've got Zhang Yimou directing. That for me, is everything. I saw JU DOU and RAISE THE RED LANTERN - and those two films heightened my interest in Asian Cinema beyond the Crime Action & Martial Arts genres that initially seduced me. Not that Zhang Yimou can't do that either, his HERO, HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS & CURSE OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER are three of the most stunningly beautiful martial arts/fantasy films that I've ever seen. If you remember the 2008 Beijeng Olympics, he directed the opening and closing ceremonies. He's a super genius! What's he going to do this time? I'm unsure, I'd love to read the script. I know it comes from a story that LEGENDARY's Thomas Tull apparently hatched with Max Brooks, but since then Ed Zwick and Marshall Herskovich and Tony Gilroy have all done passes on the script.
What's the logline on this thing?
"Zhang Yimou is directing the story of an elite force making a last stand for humanity on the world's most iconic structure."
Ok - so... let's look at those players... We got Thomas Tull, man from humble beginnings who makes more money than Bruce Wayne, decides he wants to make the movies he always wanted to see get made, so he started making DC Comic Movies that have been, well transformative for Warner's Iconic Characters, but he also loves huge fantasy flicks, horror flicks, Inspirational stories... so, there's that. Then you have Max Brooks, author of WORLD WAR Z. Some of you may have heard of it. Sold a few copies I heard. Tyler Durden turned it into a movie everyone assumed would suck, but kicked ass. Then we have Edward Zwick, GLORY, COURAGE UNDER FIRE, THE SIEGE, THE LAST SAMURAI. That last one, Zwick wrote with Marshall Herskovich. So those two cracked away at the film. Zwick was going to direct for a bit, but then left the project. It was also going to star SUPERMAN back then, yup Henry Cavill. Then they bring in Tony Gilroy, who wrote those awesome BOURNE movies which leads us to the casting announcement today!
So they announced the cast, and there's Matt Damon, probably an Elite Force member, there's Willem Dafoe, who is just always great in everything he does! But PLATOON and SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE are the roles that seared their way into my happy love cinema mind. Pedro Pascal, you remember - the cocky bastard who had a face hug by the Mountain in GAME OF THRONES? Well, he's in this - and we know he can kick ass! But I'm really excited about the Asian announced cast on this. Andy Lau!!! Jing Tian!!! I've been dying to see TAKING TIGER MOUNTAIN, but they picked Zhang Hanyu & Lin Gengxin from that! Eddie Peng of RISE OF THE LEGEND is here! Then there's a K-Pop star Lu Han! The rest of the announced cast I'm not all that familiar with, but look forward to seeing them in this, but they're Zheng Kai, Chen Xuedong, Huang Xuan, Wang Junkai, Yu Xintian & Liu Qiong!
This is being touted as the biggest movie in the history of CHINA, so I look forward to discovering what the threat to mankind's existence is that is being fought upon the Great Wall of China... I mean, that sounds like an ALAMO dire scenario to me. But really, we don't know much at all about the project. I mean, it's set on THE GREAT WALL OF CHINA, but... where? I mean, that sucker runs over 13,000 miles or something! It can be seen from space, so who knows if that will come into play.
Whatever the film is, THE GREAT WALL will open in the U.S. on November 23rd in far off 2016!! It begins shooting at the end of the month, so all you Chinese spies, I'm counting on images of this, so just camp out every 100 yards or so and we won't miss a thing! Heh.
What do you think an Elite Force is doing for humanity on the top of the Great Wall of China? I know there's like 300,000 dead workers inside that wall, so maybe it's the birth of a Zombie situation that is emerging from the Great Wall and they've gotta kill them all? Who knows?
