Legendary Hong Kong cinema filmmaker John Woo (“The Killer,” “Hard Boiled“) hasn’t made a big American studio film since the 2003 film “Paycheck” that starred Ben Affleck and Uma Thurman, an adaption of the sci-fi story from author Philip K. Dick (“Blade Runner,” “Total Recall“). Since then, Woo has been mostly focused on making films for the mainstream Chinese market with his two-part epic “Red Cliff” and “The Crossing.”
After nearly 20 years since making “Paycheck,” Deadline reports Woo is teaming with Swedish actor Joel Kinnaman (“The Suicide Squad,” “Snabba Cash“) for a high-concept action flick called “Silent Night.” Kinnaman will play a regular father that is pushed into the underworld to avenge his young son’s death, and the main gimmick here is that it will be done without any dialogue. It could be an impressive feat if John Woo can pull it off.
The project will have a small connection to “John Wick” as the franchise’s producing team of Basil Iwanyk and Erica Lee are involved here. They’re also behind the Len Wiseman-directed spinoff “Ballerina” starring Ana De Armas and a prequel television series “The Continental” at Starz.
Woo’s string of Hollywood films included “Hard Target,” “Broken Arrow,” “Face/Off,” “Mission: Impossible II,” and the WWII film “Windtalkers,” all with varying degrees of success and quality. Interestingly enough, Adam Wingard (“Godzilla vs. Kong“) is attached to develop a sequel to “Face/Off” that might include the original cast. There has been an attempt to make an American remake of his fantastic assassin thriller “The Killer,” with an actress in the lead role, giving it a slight twist.
Hopefully, “Silent Night” will skew more in the realm of his Hong Kong projects from an action standpoint. It’ll be curious to see if John Woo makes a full Hollywood comeback beyond this new project because I’m sure at 75 he still has enough gas in the tank to give modern action directors a run for their money.