Cast announced for the new "Shaolin Temple"

By Siewaun
Reference: andylausounds

The cast of the New "Shaolin Temple" movie has been confirmed with Nicholas Tse as the male lead, and Fan Bingbing as the female lead. Andy Lau, Jackie Chan and Wu Jing would be taking on supporting roles.

Hong Kong's director Benny Chan ("New Police Story" and "Rob-B-Hood") will be directing the kungfu action epic, which boasts a $29 million budget.

Benny confirmed that the movie is not a remake of Jet Li’s version of Shaolin Temple, but instead an entirely new story written by Alan Yuen who previously wrote the script for "New Police Story." He added that this new "Shaolin Temple" has advantages over other Shaolin Temple theme films because it's shooting will be located in the temple, which means the Songshan Shaolin Temple would also be heavily involved.

Cory Yuen, who has previously done "Red Cliff" and "The Transporter" will be the action director.

In the movie, Nicholas Tse will be playing an arrogant Hao Jie who has no respect for the Shaolin monks. But when his own family is tragically wiped out by a warlord, he is forced to take refuge in the Shaolin temple. Chinese kungfu actor Wu Jing will be playing Tse's fellow apprentice in the temple who later betrays his Shaolin master.

The movie is co-produced by China Film Group Corporation, Hua Yi Brothers, Hong Kong’s Emperor Group and Henan TV.

Shootings is expected to begin at the end of this year with a release slated for late 2010.