Hollywood heavyweights Samuel Jackson, Salma Hayek, and Ryan Reynolds are set to shoot the sequel of their 2017 box office hit The Hitman's Bodyguard in the picturesque Adriatic town of Rovinj, local media reported on Tuesday.

The filming is set to start in early April and is expected to last for about a month, after all the necessary permits for the film crew have been issued, the town’s mayor, Marko Paliaga, confirmed for the Glas Istre regional daily.

Glas Istre reported that an abandoned factory warehouse located in the town centre would be converted into a film set. Local media speculate that the film crew is likely to stay at some of the five-star hotels in town, including the brand new designer hotel Grand Park, which underwent an extensive 600 million kuna (€80 million) renovation project and is scheduled to open next month.

The original film, The Hitman’s Bodyguard, was released in August 2017 to mixed reviews from critics, but was a box office hit, earning more than $176 million worldwide, against an estimated budget of only $30 million.

Its sequel, tentatively titled The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard and produced by the Lionsgate film company, will be directed and written by the original team of director Patrick Hughes and writer Tom O’Connor, with the plot set in Italy’s Amalfi coast. It is slated for release in the summer of 2020.

The picturesque town of Rovinj, located in western Istria on Croatia’s northern Adriatic coast, is one of the most popular tourist destinations in the country. It had also served as one of the locations for the 2013 biopic Diana which starred Naomi Watts as the late Princess of Wales.

(€1 = 7.42 kuna)

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