The end of January 2017 will see the release of Jailbreak which promises to bring Cambodian cinema kicking and punching into the spotlight… much as The Raid did for Indonesia.
Produced by Puprom Entertainment and Kongchak Pictures, the film directed by Jimmy Henderson (Hanuman) and produced by Loy Te and Michael Chai, has a cast that includes Jean-Paul Ly, Celine Tran, and Dara Our.
Jean-Paul plays Inspector Ly, a French special agent who is sent on a mission to Cambodia to train local troops. But a simple escort mission to the infamous Koh Kla prison goes horribly wrong. Chaos reigns as the prisoners take over the prison and its surroundings and now, trapped within the prison wall, a small team of law enforcement officers must fight to survive.
The film’s cast is lead by Dara Our: the star of Henderson’s previous movie the first Cambdoian action movie Hanuman, as well as Father’s Treasure, Before the Fall and The Forest Whispers. His co-lead is Jean-Paul Ly whose action credits include work on the likes of Lucy, Now You See Me 2, Grimsby, 24, Streetfighter and most recently Doctor Strange. Ly also served as action director for the Jailbreak project.
Rounding out the cast are Tharoth Sam, the first female Bokator (Cambodian martial arts) fighter to make it into the MMA league and winner of the One FC MMA Tournament in 2014 (She can also be seen in a supporting role in Angelina Jolie’s upcoming First They Killed My Father) and Savin Phillip (First They Killed My Father and the memorable main villain in Hanuman).
Making her full-blooded feature-length action movie debut after a number of very impressive short films (Heartbreaker, Burst, Dust Machina) is French Vietnamese actress Celine Tran. (Formerly the internationally recognized adult movie icon Katsuni) who had the following to yell us about the project:
“Jailbreak brings some of the best Bokator martial artists together, which is the national martial art in Cambodia. The audience will have the opportunity to see a lot of fights with a lot of different styles but Bokator is what makes this movie so special and worth to be watched. My character is Madame, the leader of the gang of Butterflies (girls only !) and I’m not often in a good mood.Things have to go my way, if not… I tend to use my katana… (Well that was easy, this is me in real life!) I was glad I could do my action debut playing this kind of role – it’s fun to play the villain. Also did I mention I play most of the role in Khmer? And..nope, I don’t speak Khmer!”
And here’s a new sneaky-peek at the trailer for the film, below…
