Bankside Films has boarded Wayne Wang’s Diary Of A Mad Old Man and is launching the film at the EFM this week.
Gabriel Byrne and Fan Bingbing are set to star in the English-language Tokyo-set film about a stubborn professor who becomes consumed by desire when he forms a bond with his best friend’s daughter who is tasked with taking care of him.
The film is in pre-production and is set to shoot in Japan in the summer.
Kelvin Wyles wrote the screenplay, based on the novel of the same name by Japanese author, Jun’ichirō Tanizaki.
Producers are Shôzô Ichiyama of Japan’s Fourier Films, Francey Grace of Los Angeles-based Friendly Giant Pictures and Mike Goodridge of the UK’s Good Chaos.
Further producers include Andrei Epifanov of Russia’s Cinetrain, Eleonora Granata of Italy’s Melograno Films, Gu Xiaodon of Tannpopo Co and Hiroaki Kanenobu of Japan’s Nobu Pictures.
Hong Kong-born, US-based Wang won Berlin’s Silver Bear for best director in 1995 for Smoke, and the Golden Shell at San Sebastian for A Thousand Years Of Good Prayers in 2007.
This marks the first Asian project for London-based Bankside.
Previous films based on the book include Lili Rademakers’s 1987 Dutch adaptation and Japanese filmmaker Keigo Kimura’s 1962 version.
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