The Great Wall is an upcoming American-Chinese fantasy adventure action movie by Zhang Yimou. The legendary director of House of Flying Daggers, Hero and The Flowers of War.
Starring Matt Damon, Jing Tian, Pedro Pascal, Willem Dafoe, and Andy Lau. This is Zhang Yimou's first large budget English-production that is entirely filmed in China.
Matt Damon in The Great Wall has become the centre of attention since the release of the first trailer last week. The film is currently under fire for whitewashing due to the focus on the actor in the trailer.
However, Zhang Yimou has recently responded in a statement to Entertainment Weekly:
Matt Damon is not playing a role that was originally conceived for a Chinese actor. The arrival of his character in our story is an important plot point. There are five major heroes in our story and he is one of them — the other four are all Chinese. The collective struggle and sacrifice of these heroes are the emotional heart of our film. As the director of over 20 Chinese language films and the Beijing Olympics, I have not and will not cast a film in a way that was untrue to my artistic vision. I hope when everyone sees the film and is armed with the facts they will agree.
