Former Raintree Pictures head Daniel Yun has unveiled the debut slate of his new venture, Homerun Asia, including collaborations with leading filmmakers such as Peter Chan, Terence Chang and John Woo, and Australia’s Tony Ayres.

The Singapore-based company will focus on two key areas – development and production under the Homerun Pictures banner, and movie marketing under Homerun Media. Adrian Ng, owner of Singapore’s Liquid Advertising, has come on board as the company’s creative group head, and banker Terence Chia has joined as business development director. 

Among projects under development at Homerun Pictures are $5m political thriller 1965, which is being developed with Peter Chan’s We Pictures, and $20m action title Stanglehold, in partnership with Chang and Woo’s Lion Rock Productions.

Stranglehold, based on the John Woo-developed video game, will shoot in the US and Singapore and has Stephen Fung on board as director. To shoot in Singapore and Malaysia, 1965 is set during Singapore’s turbulent struggle for independence.

Meanwhile, Ayres, who worked with Yun on Home Song Stories, is set to direct $3.5m romantic comedy Good Muslim Boy. A co-production with Australia’s Matchbox Pictures, the film is about a boy who agrees to an arranged marriage although he’s in love with somebody else.

Also on Homerun’s debut slate is $5m disaster thriller Days Without Water, scripted by Korea’s Shinho Lee (The Chaser) and developed with US-based Convergence Entertainment, and $3m thriller The Gang, from first time director Kelvin Sng, a gangland thriller set in South-East Asia.

“We want to integrate talents from across Asia to develop projects with China, Korea and Japan as the primary markets and the rest of the world as the secondary market,” explains Yun. Funding will include soft money from Singapore and overseas, co-production partners and Singaporean banks.

Movie marketing will also be a key feature of Homerun, and in addition to working with Ng’s Liquid Advertising, the company has formed a strategic alliance with Cimarron Group Asia, a subsidiary of the US marketing group that has worked on titles such as Avatar and Twilight.

“We identified that there is an opportunity in Asia to focus on movie marketing as the growth in filmmaking has not been matched by professional, well thought out marketing campaigns. So we’re looking at that as a serious business,” says Yun.

Homerun is also working with Singaporean distributor Festive Films on sales and distribution, but in the initial phase is talking to existing Asian sales agents about working together and sharing international rights.

Topics