Luc Besson has developed something of a reputation for finding people you might not think would fit into action franchises – Liam Neeson, Scarlett Johansson etc. – and finding successful ways to do just that. His latest hire is a little more experienced with physicality, having worked on 300: Rise Of An Empire. Sullivan Stapleton is set to star in **The Lake.
Steven Quale, who made last year’s tornado thriller Into The Sky, is behind the camera for this one, which Besson cranked out with The Equalizer’s Richard Wenk. The Lake finds Stapleton as the head of a group of Navy SEALS who discover a mysterious trove of treasure hidden in a lake in war-torn Serbia. Their quest becomes to find out who left it there and how many crates of beer it’ll buy. Okay, maybe not the latter bit.
Besson’s EuropaCorp company has had hits with the likes of Lucy and the Taken films, so he’ll be hoping for big things from this one. Stapleton, who has also been seen in Gangster Squad, Animal Kingdom and on TV’s Strike Back, will next crop up in Kill Me Three Times, which doesn’t have a firm UK date yet, but does feature Simon Pegg with luxuriant lip foliage.