Live-Action Remake of Akira

GusherJizmac writes "Looks like Warner Bros. is looking to remake classic anime, Akira, as a live action feature-length film. Will current computer generated special effects be enough to bring this masterpiece to life?" We touched on this earlier, but now it looks closer to production, since Norrington has finished shooting for The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

Comments

Re:no way.

[WoodenBoy]

Agreed. Anyone catch the live action version of Fist of the North Star that came out a few years back? Ugh. Didn't even come close to catching the feeling of the original.

Akira was already a remake!

[shumway]

1. The Akira animated film was an adaptation of the far-superior manga epic. (The film could only squeeze about 1/4 of the full story into the two-hour format).
2. Despite its divergence from the original format/story, the film still kicked ass. There's no reason that a further adaptation to a different format won't also be successful (Actually, based on what I've read about LoEG and my knowledge of Hollywood in general, there are several, but I'm willing to reserve my judgment until I see it).
3. Read the original Series! 6 hefty volumes of insanity, drugs, mass destruction, and clown gangs. If you are lucky, your local library might even have it (request it if they don't).

More info about "League"...

[starvingartist12]

Actually, the "League" comic book is a pretty good concept by Alan Moore (Writer of "Watchmen" - arguably one of the best comic books - and the "From Hell" comic books).

It's one of those indepth comic books and draws various literary characters from the Victorian-era. I mean, someone has even posted a panel-by-panel annotation for it. The second series has a martian invasion of earth similar to War of the Worlds.

So we really want this guy to do Akira? I don't know. But that doesn't mean you should dismiss the "League" concept so quickly.

Final thoughts.... Hopefully The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen won't be butchered like the "From Hell" movie. Hmm... IIRC, Sean Connery is going to be Allan Quartermain.

Re:Staying true?

[krmt]

And thats because it was a movie that that tried to capture a story the size of the Bible in just two hours.

This is just picking nits, but there's no way in hell you can honestly compare Akira to the bible in terms of complexity. Yes, I've read the manga (I was just able to finally get volume 6 this month) and despite it's mass, it can't touch the bible in terms of plot volume, let alone dialog volume, character count, or anything else.

Akira was written by one guy, Katsuhiro Otomo. The Bible was written by committee. Which do you think is going to be more complex? ;-)

I think it's interesting that you mention the manga though, because the anime was made before the manga had ended. Otomo himself didn't know all the turns it was going to make to get to the end, but he obviously had some idea or else the manga and the anime wouldn't have ended in such a similar fasion. The anime unfortunately skipped out on all the post-apocalyptic style stuff in the latter half of the manga, but the basic themes remained intact. It's not like the anime was Starship Troopers or something.

If this guy wants to copy the anime, he won't be starting far from the mark of the manga. He'll leave out Akira's Empire and whatnot, but he could still capture the essence of the story without it.