Sleeping Dogs Movie Starring Donnie Yen Cancelled, Says Actor

The long-in-development Sleeping Dogs movie is seemingly canceled. Word of the adaptation’s status comes directly from actor Donnie Yen, who was set to headline the movie.

In an interview with Polygon, Yen shared the unfortunate news, including information about his own investments in the rights to the IP.

“I spent a lot of time and did a lot of work with these producers, and I even invested some of my own money into obtaining the drafts and some of the rights,” Yen said. “I waited for years. Years. And I really want to do it. I have all these visions in my head, and unfortunately… I don’t know, you know how Hollywood goes, right? I spent many, many years on it. It was an unfortunate thing. Well, on to better things.”

It represents another negative development for the Square Enix action video game. In the past, a direct sequel to the game, tentatively named Sleeping Dogs 2, along with a spin-off, called Triad Wars, have both been canceled.

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Updates On The Movie Had Been Scarce

Originally announced in 2017, Neal Moritz and Donnie Yen were set to collaborate on an adaptation of the video game. To that point, Morittz had gained fame for helping produce several of the Fast and Furious films. Since then, he’s chipped in on the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise. As for Yen, it was a near match made in heaven, as the actor starred in the Ip Man film series.

In 2018, Yen said the movie was “in motion” in a post on Instagram. The last official update came in mid-September of 2024, when Indonesian filmmaker, Timo Tjahjanto, shared that the project was in “development hell.”