Production
In February 2003, Hitman makers Eidos and IO Interactive entered negotiations with Hollywood production companies to adapt the video game to film. Twentieth Century Fox eventually acquired the rights and hired screenwriter Skip Woods to pen the screenplay with actor Vin Diesel executive producing and starring in the film. In December 2006, Vin Diesel stepped down from the role. In January 2007, Timothy Olyphant was cast into the lead role with director Xavier Gens attached at the helm. In March, actor Dougray Scott was cast as the antagonist to Agent 47, with Olga Kurylenko, Robert Knepper, Ulrich Thomsen, and Michael Offei also joining the cast. Production began the week of March 27, 2007 in Sofia, Bulgaria and lasted 12 weeks. A second unit also shot in locations including London, Istanbul, St. Petersburg, and Cape Town.
The release of the film was set back a few months before release, this was to allow for the reshooting of several scenes. The new scenes included a stand-off between 4 assassins who go on to participate in a sword fight, which replaced the original train platform sequence, simply consisting of Agent 47 facing off against one assassin. Reports before the film's release confirmed that not only reshoots were taking place, but that Fox may have totally removed Xavier Gens from his directing position and denied him the final cut. Nicolas de Toth was brought in at this stage to soften the edit and cut down material.
47's origins were also changed at this stage, Xavier Gens told an interviewer that whilst they are not directly dealing with the clone storyline, one scene (being the original train station sequence) which shows a bald, barcoded assassin (Jean-Marc Bellu) following Agent 47 (Timothy Olyphant), another bald, barcoded assassin, is very explicit and showed his intention to keep him as a clone. The detail was likely changed to accommodate for the casting of actors of mixed races during reshoots, making it impossible for them to be clones (or at least clones of the same person).
Read more about this topic: Hitman (2007 Film)
Famous quotes containing the word production:
“The myth of unlimited production brings war in its train as inevitably as clouds announce a storm.”
—Albert Camus (1913–1960)
“Perestroika basically is creating material incentives for the individual. Some of the comrades deny that, but I can’t see it any other way. In that sense human nature kinda goes backwards. It’s a step backwards. You have to realize the people weren’t quite ready for a socialist production system.”
—Gus Hall (b. 1910)
“By bourgeoisie is meant the class of modern capitalists, owners of the means of social production and employers of wage labor. By proletariat, the class of modern wage laborers who, having no means of production of their own, are reduced to selling their labor power in order to live.”
—Friedrich Engels (1820–1895)