Chinese film ‘Asura’ releases new trailer, posters
The producers of big-budget Chinese fantasy film Asura, released a new trailer and posters for the film at a press conference in Beijing on Tuesday.
Boasting an impressive budget for a Chinese feature (700 million yuan, $108 million), the Eastern-style fantasy film inspired by Buddhist cosmology aims to hit Chinese mainland theaters this summer as the first of a trilogy.
The trailer showed Hong Kong stars Tong Leung and Carina Lau as the two-headed King of Asura. The king is looking for his/her missing third head, which was reincarnated as a young man played by mainland actor Wu Lei, the main character of the film.
Six years in the making, the production involved the efforts of some 1,600 Chinese and 300 overseas crew members. Among the latter are dozens of Hollywood veterans who once worked on major overseas blockbusters, including costume designer for the Lord of the Rings series Ngila Dickson and Emmy-winning composer Trevor Morris.
Skywalker Sound was also brought on as sound producer.
Zhang Peng, the film’s director, is a Chinese Canadian stunt man who previously worked on Ant-Man and Kingsman: The Secret Service as fight coordinator.
“Though we have invited quite a number of Hollywood crew members, the film is a pure Chinese production funded solely by Chinese companies,” Yang Zhenjian, the film’s executive producer, noted.