The last time I heard about “Shanghai” was months ago, when the film was announced along with the Weinsteins’ plans to remake “The Seven Samurai” (it has since been cleared up that this remake is more like an “inspired by”, using the basic story structure from the original and will be about mercs instead of samurais). Since then, nothing from the film has surfaced, which is odd, considering that the movie looks like a pretty expensive period piece. Today, the first images from the film, directed by Mikael Håfström (”1408″), have surfaced online, featuring stars John Cusack, Gong Li, and Chow Yun Fat looking dapper and very “The Killer”-ish. No two-fisted gunplay in these images, but one can hope.

The plot:

An American man returns to a corrupt, Japanese-occupied Shanghai four months before Pearl Harbor and discovers his friend has been killed. While he unravels the mysteries of the death, he falls in love and discovers a much larger secret that his own government is hiding.

Wait, this isn’t a “Pearl Harbor was an inside job” movie, is it? In any case, “Shanghai” is scheduled for a December 25, 2008 release.