Warner Bros. has dated its new “Mortal Kombat” movie for March 5, 2021, with James Wan producing and Simon McQuoid directing.
“Mortal Kombat” will do battle on its opening date with Sony Pictures’ fantasy adventure “Masters of the Universe,” which Noah Centineo will lead as the Most Powerful Man in the Universe.
Pre-production on “Mortal Kombat” will start this month with cameras scheduled to start rolling in Adelaide, Australia, later this year. South Australia Premier Steven Marshall announced on May 13 that it will be the biggest film production in the state’s history.
Midway debuted the video game in 1992 with a story focusing on the monk Liu Kang working to save Earth from an evil sorcerer. The development of the first game was originally based on an idea that Ed Boon and John Tobias had of making a video game starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, but then evolved into a horror-fantasy fighting game.
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While it was critically panned, New Line’s 1995 “Mortal Kombat” movie grossed over $120 million worldwide and its sequel, “Mortal Kombat: Annihilation,” took in $50 million two years later.
Warner Bros. bought the Midway Games assets in 2009 in bankruptcy court and began developing a reboot in 2011 with Kevin Tancharoen attached to direct. Tancharoen departed from the project three years later.
Wan is the director of “Saw,” “Aquaman,” “The Conjuring,” “The Conjuring 2,” “Insidious” and “Insidious 2.”