Jackie Chan’s current project Dragon Blade seemed to come out of nowhere. Directed by Daniel Lee, the film went into production earlier this year with Mel Gibson set to play opposite Chan in this tale of Roman soldiers and Chinese soldiers teaming up to fight a greater foe.
Now it would appear that Gibson is no longer attached to the project in any way and that two other stars have joined the film to play opposite Chan. The Pianist’s Adrien Brody and Martin Blank himself Grosse Point Blank's John Cusack (and, for our money, one of the most reliable actors around) are joining the film with one playing the heroic Roman who joins Chan in battle and the other the villainous Roman who stands against them.
One might not immediately think of Brody in an action role, but he did come across well in Predators which saw him thrown into the world of tentpole action in a significant way. Meanwhile Cusack and Chan have a mutual friend in Benny the Jet Urquidez, Chan faced off against him in two of his most memorable fights in Wheels on Meals and Dragons Forever, while Cusack is a longtime student of and business partner of Urquidez, battling him in Grosse Point Blank. Urquidez has already been seen on set, so we might finally get to see a third film face-off between Chan & Urquidez.
As previously reported here, Chan will begin Skiptrace shortly after completing Dragon Blade, with Renny Harlin now at the helm and Sean Willam Scott and Fan Bing-bing as his co-leads.
