Gunner wrote:Mark L. Lester comes up with the story, probably writes a treatment or something, possibly sometime around 1990 or earlier, and Martin Caan also works on it.
Steven Glantz and Caliope Brattlestreet write the first version of the script titled Sgt. K, based on Lester's story.
After them, Gary DeVore and Dennis Hackin each write their own versions, also titled Sgt. K. This is interesting, because i read that they were involved in some uncredited work on Dolph's other films or wrote some unproduced scripts in which he was going to be involved in.
Steve Sharon writes his version in either May or June of 1990, which is re-titled into Yakuza, and it gets some attention to the project, and i can see why, because his script is very good. It reads more like serious version of the same story from the film, with some differences. I can even see how it could have been slightly re-worked and turned into the sequel if the first film wasn't messed with and was more successful.
Jonathan Lemkin is brought in to write the final shooting script during production of the film in January-March of 1991, and the movie is re-titled again into Showdown In Little Tokyo.
That's it. Am i correct about this or did i make some mistakes?
Lester came up with the story based on a news article about Yakuza bodies found dead in the L.A. river. Not sure how much Caan really contributed to the story.
Glantz and Battle street were hired to pen the screenplay by Martin Caan since they're friends.
Steve Sharon was hired for a rewrite right after that, and it's his retitled "Yakuza" draft that got the movie going (with also excellent word of mouth in the industry). Warner then changed the title to SHOWDOWN IN LITTLE TOKYO and put it on the cover of some of the copies sent of Sharon's script. That was in the summer of 1990.
Steven Seagal passed and Dolph Lundgren was signed in September '90 with Brandon Lee probably soon after.
I'm not sure when Gary Devore (also a friend of Caan's with whom they also did PENTATHLON with Dolph) and Dennis Hackin came in but I guess later in the process, and until Jonathan Lemkin did work on the production script (prior to and during shooting I guess) since the idea was to make it more tongue-in-cheek and "action comedy".
All this happened in a very short period of time by industry standards since cameras rolled by January 1991 (not to mention the short turnaround from March to August before the US release).
Fun facts;
In early 2000's Steven Seagal was involved to star in an action movie titled Yakuza, and the plot was slightly similar to Showdown In Little Tokyo, however it was cancelled very soon into pre-production. I'm mentioning this just because i thought it was interesting, considering how SILT had the same title at one point.
Yeah, and he did INTO THE SUN instead!
maybe the people who were involved in SILT read that script and hired him based on his work in it. It has similar style like SILT, and the story is really not very serious, so i wouldn't be surprised.
I don't know perhaps, but he was a hot commodity for uncredited rewites and polishes at the time and did quite a few for Warner I believe...
alex.sp89 wrote:hello !!!i am new to this awesome fansite of almighty Dolph Lundgren!!!
Welcome and thank you!!
alex.sp89 wrote:Do u remember the Bansai club ? This is the same location used in Marked for death (1990) where Screwface and gang use to party and final action scene was filmed there
Comparison - different angles and decoration
This is great, thank you for pointing out and posting the screenshot!
The reason why they cut those scenes out was the budget I guess, and too similar to Steven Seagal's movie Marked for Death released one year earlier
Cutting the film down had nothing to do with the budget or the MARKED FOR DEATH similarities. SILT was aimed to be like a Seagal movie (actually they offered the movie to him before going to Dolph). It's one of those paradoxal studio behaviour where they supported the movie 100% until they changed their mentality or an executive got replaced it was decided to cut the movie again and again (notably by their "go to" slasher guy Stuart Baird) and not give it a proprer wide release theatrically... Will cover the whole story on my long gestating career book on Dolph's movies and their behind the scenes.
alex.sp89 wrote:Admin why do u think we will never get the special edition or director's cut of this one ?
I'm rather pessimistic when it comes to this rather than getting my hopes up, and until recently, Warner wouldn't do it and wouldn't give their titles to any other label.
But you're right, they've been finally sub-licensing some of their titles to niche labels such as Shout! Factory and I had almost forgotten because it's fairly new and all those years library titles like this or even more prestigious would never be given the special edition treatment.
When I interviewed Mark Lester a year or two before the US Blu-ray release, he told me he knew one of the Warner execs and was gonna make them do a special edition of SILT. Obviously that did not happen, just like Warner scraped a MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE special edition at the last minute whereas extras were ready for delivery.
But ieven though SILT has grown to be a cult movie, does it have the fan base that COBRA or the early Seagal movies do for Shout to believe in a release? The Warner catalogue probably isn't as cheap as other independent library titles so that must play into their criteria as well.
We'll see, if it happens, then I couldn't be more thrilled!