Announced by Deadline back on Thursday, martial artist and star of the Ip Man films Donnie Yen is set to feature in a film adaptation of Sleeping Dogs. The adaptation is headed by Fast and Furious producer Neal Moritz, who is also signed on to produce the upcoming Sonic the Hedgehog movie.
For more open world action, peruse our list of the top PC sandbox games.
Set in Hong Kong, a Sleeping Dogs adaptation has all the ingredients to make a great action film, complete with martial arts brawls, gunfights, boat chases and intrigue. It is uncertain at this time if the film will be a straight adaptation, with Yen playing undercover cop Wei Shen or a loose adaptation of the game. In any case, Yen’s presence on the project guarantees some great fight choreography.
With Yen being a massive box office draw in China and with the recent Warcraft movie doing gangbusters there, this Sleeping Dogs adaptation has the makings of a success, even if the actual film is pants. If they could somehow get John Woo on board, it could be the first great film adaptation of a videogame. Hell, getting the Raid director Gareth Evans on the project would make for one amazing action film.
Hopefully, the success of a Sleeping Dogs film could revive the chances of an actual sequel to the lauded sandbox game, as plans for a follow up were canned by Square Enix back in 2013.
Based on this small snippet of information, this adaptation is probably still in the very early stages of pre-production at the moment. Expect this sleeping dog to lie for a fair while before we get any more details.