House of Flying Daggers director to remake the Coen Brothers’ Blood Simple?

Back in February, Shockya reported that Spider-Man director Sam Raimi was attached to produce a remake of the martial arts film House of Flying Daggers. Now comes a report from Empire, that Zhang Yimou – director of that seminal kung fu epic as well as Jet Li’s Hero, and choreographer of the amazing display at the Beijing Olympics last year, is directing a Hong Kong remake of the Coen Brothers’ 1984 crime thriller Blood Simple.

San Qiang Pi An Jing Qi, which according to the Empire article roughly translates as The Stunning Case of the Three Gunshots, began lensing on June 9th. It stars Sun Hong Lei from Seven Swords, Ni Dahong, Chinese comedian Xiao Shenyang and Wang Xiaohua. The movie will be Zhang’s first film since Curse of the Golden Flower in 2006. Reports say the film is a two-part suspense thriller/comedy, which also goes by the title of Amazing Tales – Three Guns.

Blood Simple’s winding plot revolves around a love triangle, a private detective and murder. The 1984 original starred Frances McDormand, John Getz, M. Emmet Walsh and Dan Hedaya, and followed a wealthy Texas bar owner who hires a private detective to kill his wife and her lover. But in true Coen Brothers fashion – things don’t go as planned, leading to double crosses and much dry mayhem.

This type of story could very well be in Zhang’s wheelhouse, after the bitter family drama of ‘Golden Flower’.

The Coen Brothers in the meantime, are currently prepping a remake of their own – the John Wayne classic western True Grit.

Check out the trailer for the 1984 version of Blood Simple below.

And here’s the trailer for John Wayne’s True Grit.