With Spike Lee’s Oldboy set for release later this year and Charlize Theron attached to Sympathy for Lady Vengeance, we can now add the first chapter of Chan-wook Park’s ‘Vengeance’ trilogy to the list of films getting English language remakes, with The Wrap reporting that director Hany Abu-Assad (Paradise Now) is set to adapt 2002’s Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance.
Abu-Assad is coming off the back of a Jury Prize win at Cannes for Omar and will direct the Hollywood version of Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance from a script by screenwriter Brian Tucker (Broken City). The project is being produced by Silver Reel, Lotus Entertainment, di Bonaventure Pictures and CJ Entertainment, and the search is now on for “top talent” for the lead roles in the revenge thriller about a deaf-mute man sucked into the world kidnapping and black market organ traders as he tries to save enough money to pay for a kidney transplant for his sister.
Originally published September 12, 2013. Updated April 11, 2018.
