A live-action version of Katsuhiro Otomo's seminal manga and anime Akira has been grumbling away in development hell since the early 1990s. Last September saw the first news in a long time emerge, that a new script was being worked on by Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby. And now we're hearing from New York Magazine's Vulture that Warners are finalising the paperwork with The Hughes Brothers to direct.
Fergus and Ostby co-wrote the excellent Children of Men (not to mention Iron Man and Cowboys Vs. Aliens) so they've proved they know their way around a dystopia. But The Hughes Brothers are a surprise. Clearly the performance of The Book of Eli has put them in favour at Warners, but nothing on their CV (Menace II Society, Dead Presidents, From Hell) so far has hinted at future projects of the colossal magnitude of Akira.
Leonardo DiCaprio's company Appian Way is part of the production team, along with Andrew Lazar, who's currently wrangling Jonah Hex. Talk is still of two films, each roughly covering three books of the six-volume manga (Otomo's two-hour original film was made before the books had finished, and ends differently), with a budget of at least $300m. We won't even attempt a plot synopsis (here's a trailer if you're new here{
If this comes off, it'll be a sci-fi extravaganza up there with Blade Runner and The Matrix and Avatar. If not, two words for you: Johnny Mnemonic. We'll be astonished if it isn't in 3D. And we'll be even more amazed if, as Vulture suggest, part one is released next year. Not a chance. We're saying 2012 at the earliest.