Summit Entertainment has hired Justin Lin to direct the next instalment of Highlander. Neal H. Moritz will be the producer for the movie.
The combination, a favourite of the Summit is because Lin and Moritz were responsible for the delivery of Universal Pictures’ most successful title of the year, ‘Fast and Furious’.
Although a cast for the next Highlander movie has not been decided as yet, Summit already has Art Marcum and Matt Holloway working on the script.
The original instalment of Highlander, released in 1986 starred Christopher Lambert, Sean Connery, Clancy Brown and Roxanne Hart. It resulted in four sequels and three TV spinoffs. With the new movie, Summit plans to take the original story and expand on it a great deal. It will centre on the immortal Scottish swordsman Connor MacLeod who has to confront a murderous barbarian who lusts for a fabled prize.
Lin, a Taiwanese American film director earned an MFA in film directing from the UCLA Film School. Better Luck Tomorrow, his solo directorial debut made a huge splash amongst critics and fans. Annapolis, his next work, brought in mixed reviews but sold over 4 million DVD copies, and stayed on top 10 rental lists across the US.
His latest work, the fourth in the Fast and Furious series grossed $30.5 million and peaked at the top spot of the weekend box office with $70,950,500. It is also the highest-grossing opening weekend even in April and of any car-oriented movie. The previous record was held by Cars, which raked in $60.1 million.