Deadline: The twists and turns on the Warner Bros adaptation of anime artist Katsuhiro Otomo’s graphic novel Akira continue. Director Albert Hughes is exiting the movie, I’m told. Insiders say that it is an amicable creative differences parting of the ways. Warner Bros will try to put him on another movie right away (Hughes and his brother Allen directed the hit The Book of Eli, and WB topper Jeff Robinov is their former agent and is very close with them). Hughes is coming to Hollywood next week to take meetings with his WME reps and look at scripts, hoping to find his next movie at Warner Bros.
Hoping for more exits. BURN IT DOWN!
Unless they try a faithful live action epic full of weird awesomeness, but we both know that will never happen because "Hollywood" is incapable of delivering anything resembling what I just said.
Until there's a catastrophic event like Hiroshima (God forbid) on American soil, involving unchecked technology, an American Akira will not have the cultural relevance that the original Akira did. If they change it so that there is relevance to American culture, why call it Akira at all?
I'd still love to see an adaptation of Akira but NOT in the manner they were going with this. No American could pull off names like Tetsuo, Kaneda, Kaori, or any of the other ones for that matter. Get some English speaking Japanese actors, allow it to take place in Japan and lets see a proper ADAPTATION not a RE-IMAGINING.
I wouldn't mind a reimaging of Akira, if they didn't use the Akira name. You know what, use the Akira name, but don't call it Akira, call it Damien: An Akira Story, or something like that, with plenty of nods to the original.