John Woo’s English-language remake of 1989 film ‘The Killer’ reportedly arriving in 2023

Hong Kong action movie director John Woo will helm the English-language remake of his film The Killer, arriving in 2023 on streaming platform Peacock 16 years after it was first announced.

According to The Wrap, the cast for English-language remake of The Killer has not been announced, but the movie is set to premiere on the streaming platform sometime in 2023 as part of Peacock’s slate of three original movies to be released next year.

The remake of the 1989 classic starring Chow Yun-fat was first announced in 2007 and was originally set to be helmed by Korean-American director John H. Lee. At the time, Lion Rock Productions’ Terence Chang told Reuters that the film would be based in Los Angeles, with a Korean-American lead actor.

“In John’s original version, it doesn’t really matter where the film is set, except that Hong Kong has this dragon boat festival which adds a bit of local flavour. In this remake, we will use the geography of Los Angeles to move the story forward,” the producer said.

Lee left the project due to delays in 2015. In April 2018, Deadline announced Woo had cast Lupita Nyong’o for the remake, but the actress also eventually dropped out due to delays.

The remake is reportedly part of a slate of three Peacock movies – the streaming service’s first originals – made in collaboration with Universal Pictures. The other two movies are Shooting Stars, which tells Lebron James’ origin story as a high school basketball player and the dramedy Praise This from Girls Trip producer Will Packer.

Woo last year announced that he would be returning to US cinema for the first time in two decades with the upcoming action film Silent Night. The Joel Kinnaman-led project is an action film which features no dialogue whatsoever, and follows a father as he heads into the underworld to avenge his young son’s death.

John Wick producers Basil Iwanyk, Erica Lee, Christian Mercuri and Lori Tilkin have all joined the crew of Silent Night.

Woo is best known by western audiences for directing Hard Target, Face/Off, Mission: Impossible 2, Paycheck and Broken Arrow. The director’s catalogue includes his acclaimed Hong Kong-based action films A Better Tomorrow and Bullet In The Head.

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