French director Luc Besson earned a place in science fiction history with his futuristic vision in The Fifth Element in 1997, and recently revisited the genre with Lucy in 2014.
Now, Besson is coming back to the genre with the adaptation of the French comic series Valérian and Laureline, written by Pierre Christin and illustrated by Jean-Claude Mézières.
The comic follows spatio-temporal agents Valerian and Laureline as they travel the universe through time and space.
Cineuropa shares that Besson’s new sci-fi adventure was made on a €197.47 million budget, according to a report published by CNC in 2016, making it the most expensive production in French film history.
The number one spot was previously held by Asterix at the Olympic Games (2008) with a €78 million budget – an adventure-fantasy film which, by the way, received the “Gérard du cinéma” for “Worst French film made in 2007”.
Another film by EuropaCorp makes it into the top 10 biggest budget French films of 2016: Renegades (originally titled The Lake), a French-German action thriller directed by Steven Quale and written and produced by Luc Besson.
Renegades was made on a €66.19 million budget and is scheduled for a September 1 release. »