Production begins next week on One Last Dance,a Hong Kong-set gangster picture which is already attracting internationalinterest.

The $2.5m film has an unusual cast of co-producersincluding Mediacorp Raintree Pictures of Singapore, China's Ming Productionsand A-Film of The Netherlands.

Shot in Cantonese and directed by Brazilian-AmericanMax Makowski, One Last Dance is described by producer Peter Loehr as a"twist-filled, genre-bending Hong Kong gangster film." Makowski previouslydirected 1998's The Pigeon Egg Strategy and episodes of TV's cultmake-over series Queer Eye For The Straight Guy. His company The FilmBund is a producer and co-produced Pigeon Egg. One Last Dancestars Francis Ng, the Hong Kong veteran who was a revelation in InfernalAffairs II.

Although the film is set in Hong Kong, filming is located in Singapore the support of the Singapore's Media Development Authority. The shoot will wrap by the end of the year and thefilm will pursue a spot on the spring festival schedule with Asian theatricalreleases to follow.

The film has been pre-sold to Gaga Communications forJapan. In Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Thailand itwill be handled through Raintree while A-Film has rights in France and Benelux.In North America it is represented by John Sloss and Cinetic Media. No salesagent is yet attached for other territories.

"We are very excited about the fact that we have beenable to attract strong partners and pre-sales in major territories based on thestrength of our script - this doesn't usually happen with local languagefilms," said Loehr.

Raintree CEO and executive producer, Daniel Yun said:"This is a collaboration which combines the talents from across Asia andbeyond, with a unique take on a subject matter that is appealing to anincreasingly bigger audience base. We are hoping this movie will break out andset a brand new trend in this part of the world."