Director Zhang Yimou is finally back making films again after 3 years. He last worked on the movie “Curse of the Golden Flower in 2006.

He became more famous for directing the hit movies “Hero” in 2002 and “The House of Flying Daggers” in 2004. He was last seen working on the Opening & Closing Ceremony of 2008 Summer Olympics held in Beijing, China together with Zhang Jigang.

His current movie with an English title “Amazing Tales: Three Guns” is an adaptation of the 1984 Hollywood film by brothers Joel & Ethan Coen titled “Blood Simple”. The story is about a restaurant owner played by Dahong Ni, who after learning that his wife (Ni Yan) slept with the waiter (Xiao Shen-yang), hires a corrupt patrol officer (Honglei Sun) to kill his wife and her lover. But the plan didn’t run smoothly as he was stuck to some sticky situations and double crosses.

But the internationally acclaimed Chinese director made his own Asian version of the movie. He only used the plot and the characters of the story but he changed the tone of the film. He split the movie’s theme into two parts – a suspense thriller and a comedy. Such an odd combination isn’t it? I wonder how an action-drama film with suspense can be mixed with comedy? Maybe that’s why hes received so many awards including the Berlin International Film Festival in 1987 for his directorial debut film “Red Sorghum” and Venice International Film Festivals in 1992 & 1999 for the films “The Story of Qiu Ju” and “Not One Less”. Director Zhang was also a runner up in Time Magazine’s Person of the Year in 2008. For sure Zhang is a director who likes to take some risks and generally these risks work out, so I’m expecting nothing but great things from his next movie!

Filming started in Gansu Province (China) and is currently under post-production. It was slated for release in time for celebration of Chinese New Year (Jan-Feb 2010). Mr. William Kong produced the film and will be distributed by China Film. Sony Pictures Classics will have the rights to release the film in US.

Sources: imdb.com, beyondhollywood.com, livingincinema.com