Snow Piercer Gets A $40 Million Boost

By Brent McKnight | Updated

This article is more than 2 years old

South Korean director Bong Joon-ho is in Prague, hard at work on his English-language debut, the post-apocalyptic action film Snow Piercer. There have been some issues with funding, but massive media conglomerate CJ Entertainment is stepping up in a big way, investing 45 billion won, the equivalent of $40 million.

The post-apocalyptic train from French graphic novel Le Transperceneige

The folks behind Snow Piercer have one hell of an international pedigree. Not only is Bong responsible for films like Memories of Murder and Mother—not to mention The Host, the best giant monster movie in recent years—but Park Chan-wook (Oldboy, Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance) is handling the producing duties. That is a powerful combination of creative talents behind this picture.

Chris Evans, hot off another turn as Captain America in The Avengers, headlines a stellar cast. John Hurt, Tilda Swinton, Jamie Bell, Octavia Spencer, Ewen Bremmer, Song Kang-ho, and Ko Ah-sung round out the international call sheet.

Based on the French graphic novel Le Transperceneige, Snow Piercer tells the story of a train traveling in endless loops through an ice bound future. The passengers are the last remaining remnants of a devastating conflict, and have to figure out how to survive after the end of the world as they know it, as well as deal with each other while living in a sardine can. Piling characters into such a compressed setting, coupled with the strain and destruction of war, guarantees grand scale conflict.

Snow Piercer has quickly climbed to the top of my I’m-super-stoked-about-this-movie list. Scheduled for release in 2013, this financial hiccup seems like it is hopefully all smoothed out, and things can proceed as planned.