MGM has paid high six figures against a potential seven-figure deal to turn the cult comic “Bulletproof Monk” into a live-action film that will star Chow Yun-fat as the title character. John Woo and Terence Chang’s Lion Rock Prods. will produce the pic.
The adventure about an immortal Tibetan martial arts master who becomes a mentor to a young urban street kid will be scripted by Cy Voris and Ethan Reiff, a team that’s fast building momentum. Project was bought on the basis of a pitch delivered by the writers as well as Michael Yanover, the publisher and controller of the rights to the comic. Yanover will exec produce. MGM made the purchase as Woo and Chang gear up with projects after moving their overall deal to the studio in January.
At this point Woo is aboard merely as a producer, though he and Chow have a long record of collaboration in Hong Kong on such action classics as “The Killer.” Woo most recently directed Tom Cruise in “Mission: Impossible 2” and will next direct Nicolas Cage in the WWII drama “Wind Talkers,” with Chang now scouting locations in Hawaii.
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Chow, who followed “The Replacement Killers” by teaming with Jodie Foster in “Anna and the King,” most recently starred in the Ang Lee-directed “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon,” a Hong Kong-style action film which is preeming in Cannes for Sony and Good Machine.
Scribes Voris and Reiff previously wrote “Demon Knight: Tales From the Crypt” and “Camelot 3000,” and they are currently scripting the Disney pic “Number One Son” as a vehicle for Jet Li to topline.
The scribes also have a seven-figure overall TV deal at Warner Bros., where they created the series “Brimstone,” which starred Peter Horton, and are awaiting a possible fall pickup for “MK3” by the Fox Network. The writers, Chow, Woo and Chang and Yanover were repped in the deal by William Morris.
