First Look at ASURA, China's First $100M Budget Film

With large Hollywood studio films making hundreds of millions of dollars in China alone it seems insane that the highest budget Chinese film made until recently was Stephen Chow's The Mermaid for $60 million. The Mermaid has made $553 worldwide so far. The average budget for a tentpole Chinese films is around $50 million.

Asura is an fantasy film loosely based on a Buddhist mythological realm of "pure desire" that becomes threatened by a lower heavenly kingdom, cue epic battles and a $100 million budget.

To mitigate the risk of the film's epic production budget China is tapping Oscar-winning winning talent and Hollywood veterans. Peng Zhang is directing and has 20 years of experience as a stunt coordinator on films like Ant-Man, Kingsman, 47 Ronin, Kick-Ass, and The Chronicles of Riddick. Ngila Dickson is costume designer and won an Oscar for her work on The Lord of The Rings. Charlie Iturriaga is visual effects supervisor and has worked on TRON: Legacy, X-Men: Days of Future Past, and Deadpool.

As you can see from the photos, this looks like a movie with huge scope and amazing production quality. If all goes well Asura will be the first in a trilogy. Asura is expected to be released sometime in the summer of 2018.

H/T: Hollywood Reporter and South CN