In the martial arts movie world, Scott Adkins is never not on a roll, and 2025 is shaping up to be a very packed year for the gravity-defying MMA action action legend. In addition to the upcoming “Prisoner of War” and “Skyline: Warpath” (the latter of which re-unites Scott with his “Triple Threat” co-star Iko Uwais), Scott has also headlined another of 2025’s most hard-hitting action flicks, “Diablo”, which re-teams Scott with his “Undisputed 3: Redemption” and “Savage Dog” co-star along with marking Scott’s first movie with Marko’s frequent directorial collaborator, Ernesto Diaz Espinoza.
In “Diablo”, one-time bank robber Kris Chaney (Scott Adkins) makes it out of prison and heads for Colombia, where he makes off with Elisa (Alanna De La Rossa), with Elisa’s crime boss father Vicente (Lucho Velasquez) immediately launches a search for both of them. Kris holds a bitter grudge against Vicente from their bank robbing days, and says he is rescuing Elisa from her ruthless father to honor the dying wish of Elisa’s mother. However, the mysterious one-handed assassin El Corvo (Marko Zaror) complicates the conflict with Vicente, El Corvo being on his own revenge mission against Vicente.
Today, KFK sits down with Scott to talk about the making of “Diablo”, working with Marko Zaror again and with Ernesto for the first time, and some of his other upcoming action-packed projects like “Prisoner of War” and “Skyline: Warpath”!
Hello Scott, welcome back to Kung Fu Kingdom! Great to speak to you again and hope you’re doing well!
Hi Brad, I’m doing fantastic, great to speak again!
Awesome, Scott! Well, let’s go ahead and dive right into the making of “Diablo”. What can you share about how you came aboard the movie?
Well, Marko and I have made a lot of films together, and we wanted to do another one with us starring together, so we came up with this story some more, and then we hired Matt Sansom to write it. My manager is also the producer, and I gave him the script, he took it to the right people, and we found a place to make it in Colombia. We had a great experience in Colombia, great stunt team that were helping us out, Legionnaire Stunts, great producers, great actors like Alanna De La Rossa and Lucho Velasquez, everything was cool. It was a tough shoot, but it was pretty smooth sailing from the production standpoint, which you need.
So, what was “Diablo” like for you in terms of the movie being your first time working with director Ernesto Diaz Espinoza?
Yeah, it was great! I had a very easygoing relationship with him. He’s a very smart director, knows exactly what he wants, doesn’t waste time, knows how to shoot the action, and understands the genre. Understands many genres. He wanted horror elements in this as well as the action. He’s great talking to the actors and knows how to speak to actors, which honestly, a lot of directors in the action field don’t. It was fantastic, and hopefully, I’ll be working with Ernesto again.
So, what would you say were some of your favourite moments or experiences from the making of “Diablo”?
I really enjoyed working with Alanna De La Rossa. She’s a brilliant actress, and we knew we had to get the right actress for that part, because she’s the heart of the movie, and Alanna’s amazing in the film. I also really enjoyed the food in Colombia! I can tell you that, they’ve got great food!
No doubt! So, what it like working with Marko Zaror again on “Diablo”, given how many fight scenes you both have done together previously?
We wanted to make this one a bit more gritty and realistic, but still have a lot of flair for it to be cinematic. Obviously, it’s different to the Boyka movies, which are very much acrobatic, Hong Kong-style. We wanted this to be more hard-hitting and reality-based, almost like “Flash Point”, and I think we achieved that. We’d love more time to make more of it, but I think we got a hell of a lot of action in there for the time we had.
There’s a café sequence where we lost a day. We were meant to get two days for that action sequence, but we had to do it in about half a day. Things like that can be disappointing, but if you watch the film, you probably wouldn’t even miss what we were going to do. But with the fights, we wanted them gritty and hard-hitting, and I think we achieved that.
Was that the café scene with the one where the still of you doing the jump spinning back kick was from?
Yeah, and I accidentally hit him straight in the face. I was meant to hit him in the chest, and my excuse is that it’s 2,800 feet above sea level, so I was feeling a bit dizzy that day! But he was cool, man, he was a tough stunt guy and he was like “I’m honored to get kicked by you Scott, thank you sir!” And actually, he got cut going through the glass, so that was the real worry.
Yikes, glad to hear he wasn’t too badly hurt? Were there any other injuries or mishaps in the making of “Diablo”?
Well, that’s expected. If you’re a stuntman and you go through a glass window, you know you’re going to get cut. That’s just part of the job. But there were no major incidents, we had a great stunt team, they kept us safe, they gave us some great, realistic, old-school looking stunts, car hits, high falls. Marko Zaror choreographed and designed all the action, and he did a fantastic job. He created a great character, he helped write the script, he designed the action, what more can you ask for?
Indeed! Well, as we prepare to sign off, Scott, what can you share about your other upcoming 2025 projects, “Prisoner of War” and “Skyline: Warpath”? What other projects do you have in the works after your 2025 slate?
Well, I haven’t seen “Warpath” yet, but I have seen “Prisoner of War”, and I’m really happy with that one. It turned out great, and Louis Mandylor, my good friend from “The Debt Collector” films, he directed it and he’s a brilliant director. We had the same director of photography that we had on “Diablo”, Niccolo De La Fere, and he’s brilliant, so look out for “Prisoner of War”.
I’ve also got “The RIP” coming out with Matt Damon and Ben Affleck in January, and a movie called “Reckless”, and there are a few other projects coming up. I like to work, and people know that!
Totally agree! Thank you so much for your time today, Scott! It’s been a real pleasure, and good luck with the release of “Diablo”, “Prisoner of War”, “Skyline: Warpath”, and all your exciting upcoming actin projects!
Thanks Brad, great speaking to Kung Fu Kingdom again today!
Marko has done the fight choreography on all the movies we’ve made together. We really wanted the fight scenes in “Diablo” to be at the level of Scott’s movies, and it was a lot of hard work.
Diablo is Scott Adkins and Marko Zaror’s latest action packed fight fest!
