Fox is taking a fresh start on
A Bittersweet Life, with
Michael B. Jordan attached to star and
Jennifer Yuh Nelson to direct the action thriller remake of the cult classic 2005 Korean film. Jordan will play a mobster whose longtime loyalties to his crime family are challenged when his boss orders him to kill a mistress he’s recently grown close to. The filmmakers see this as a high concept, character driven genre film with franchise potential. 21 Laps’
Shawn Levy, Dan Levine and Dan Cohen are producing in conjunction with CJ Entertainment, latter of which made the original film. Jason Young will oversee for Fox.
Nelson comes from animation, and got an Oscar nom directing
Kung Fu Panda 2, and she co-directed
Kung Fu Panda 3. She made her live action debut directing the sci-fi thriller
The Darkest Minds for Fox and 21 Laps, based on the Alexandra Bracken best selling YA trilogy. Jordan re-teamed with
Creed director Ryan Coogler in Marvel’s
Black Panther and he is currently starring with Michael Shannon in the Ramin Bahrai-directed
Fahrenheit 451 for HBO. He’ll reprise in the
Creed sequel, with Sylvester Stallone currently working on that script for MGM.
This marks another splashy project for 21 Laps, whose Denise Villenueve-directed Best Picture nominee
Arrival, which Eric Heisserer wrote based on the Ted Chiang short story, just won the HUGO Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form. 21 Laps produced that with FilmNation and Lava Bear. The 21 Laps series
Stranger Things is up for 18 Emmys including Best Drama series, and returns Halloween on Netflix, with its Comic-Con trailer racking up 172 million views on YouTube and Facebook.
Nelson, Jordan and 21 Laps are repped by WME. Nelson’s lawyered by Hansen Jacobson, Jordan is managed by MGMT and attorney Gregory Slewett and Levy’s company is lawyered by Ziffren Brittenham.
