We have some exciting – and some disappointing – news about the Sleeping Dogs movie.
Do you remember that? Sleeping Dogs was certainly quite the video game when it released in 2012. Originally conceived as a game in Activision’s True Crime franchise, the publisher surprisingly decided to cancel the game’s release. What’s surprising about this is that the game was complete and ready to go, with Activision citing stiff competition as the reason for doing so.
Developer United Front Games was forced to lay off 120 staff, and could have closed then and there. Square Enix chose to buy the publishing rights to the game, but not the True Crime IP. As a result, United Front was able to stick around for a little longer, releasing it under Square Enix’s banner with the name we know it for today.
And Sleeping Dogs is absolutely a Hong Kong action movie in spirit. Playing Wei Shen, you are a cop in deep undercover, torn between following Triad orders to keep your cover, and doing your real work as an officer of the law. But unlike your average Mei Ah Entertainment DVD, you got to play this scenario out in an open world video game.
Sleeping Dogs sold 1.5 million units by September 2012, but that was ultimately not enough to cover what Square Enix spent to acquire and publish it. United Front Games would go out on their own, working on other titles like Halo: The Master Chief Collection, but would also go under in 2016. While these were all dire signs, there was a slim hope that we could still keep seeing more Sleeping Dogs.
That’s because a real film adaptation had been announced all the way back in 2017. The project was announced with DJ2 Entertainment and Original Film. Most notably, they tapped genuine Hong Kong movie legend Donnie Yen to play Wei Shen.
That brings us to today, as Indonesian film director Timo Tjahjanto made a surprise revelation:
“Several years ago, I get to meet Donnie Yen to develop a project based on a video Game. Sadly it went into development hell.
Still kinda hoping it will set sail again. Who doesn’t love Donnie wrecking shit in the world of Triad n sleazy undercover cop.”
While Timo did not name the project, it’s pretty clear from that description that was referring to Sleeping Dogs. Donnie’s most recent movies have been John Wick 4 and a potential spinoff to that movie starring his character Cain.
Timo has been making movies since 2007, with his biggest hits being the 2019 horror flick May The Devil Take You, and 2016 action film Headshot, as one half of the Mo Brothers.
While we can definitely see Timo making an incredible ode to Hong Kong action movies with Sleeping Dogs, it’s disappointing that it’s also stuck in production. Hopefully going public with it, just as Timo finished production on his latest film The Shadow Strays, will compel the producers to get everything moving again. After the success of the Fallout and The Last Of Us shows, Hollywood knows that video games are fertile ground for new productions to compete with Marvel.
