The China-filmed action flick Hidden Strike has been hidden indeed, having been shot all the way back in 2018… but a first trailer has arrived.
If you’re wondering why you might not have heard of the upcoming Jackie Chan/John Cena action flick, Hidden Strike, there’s a couple of possible reasons for that.
Firstly, the project has been through a couple of name changes for reasons that remain unbeknownst to us. Originally titled Snafu, the film was the renamed as Project X-Traction (wow!) before finally settling on the far more generic Hidden Strike.
Still, it’s an apt enough title because Hidden Strike has been, well, hidden. The film was shot in China all the way back in 2018 in pre-Covid times and has been more or less sitting on the shelf since then, awaiting release. There’s still no release date for the film but it is expected to come out sometime this year.
As for the story, Hidden Strike is ‘set in the near future during an oil war, two ex-special forces soldiers are paired together for a special mission escorting a group of civilians along Baghdad’s “Highway of Death” to the safety of the Green Zone.’
The project was directed by Scott Waugh, helmer of The Expendables 4 and Sylvester Stallone was originally set to star in the Cena role before dropping out. As for why the film has sat on the shelf for so long, there are a couple of theories but these are far from confirmed.
One is that China’s shift in national release strategies has veered towards homegrown cinema that fully embodies its national values, such as propaganda movies like Battle At Lake Changjin and its sequel. As an American/Chinese co-production, it’s possible that the film fell foul of this shift in policy and has had to wait this long for a Chinese release window. There’s also that episode in 2021 when John Cena felt compelled to make a public apology for comments about Tawain that offended China during his promotional work for Fast 9.
Whatever the holdup may have been, it looks like the film will finally be with us sooner rather than later and you can enjoy the trailer below. Cena’s star has only continued to rise since 2018 so as long as the film has secured release dates everywhere it needs to, the delay could actually be of benefit to the film’s producers. We’ll bring you a release date when we hear it.
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