Nintendo is planning to take direct control of their movie licensing business, as they put their own money into a live action Zelda.
It was obvious it would happen the moment The Super Mario Bros. Movie was a smash hit and now Nintendo has confirmed it: there’s going to be Legend Of Zelda film too.
The only real question has been whether it’ll be a live action or animated film, but while no actors have been announced yet it’s going to be the former – which is going to create some interesting questions over whether protagonist Link will talk or not.
We do know the director though, who will be Wes Ball. That seems a rather discouraging choice, as his only films to date are the Maze Runner trilogy. Although he also has the fourth Planet of the Apes reboot film coming out next year.
Nintendo will be taking a much more active role in the production of this movie, putting up 50% of the money themselves – which is a bold move for them. We just hope they remember what happened to Square when they tried to move into the movie business (spoiler: they had to merge with Enix to avoid going bust).
Ironically, Nintendo will be teaming up with Sony Pictures for the rest of the financing, and to handle distribution. So the movie’s going to start with the logos of both Nintendo and Sony.
Zelda creator Shigeru Miyamoto will act as co-producer on the film, alongside Ari Arad, a famous Hollywood producer that has been involved in a huge range of pop culture franchises, including many of the early Marvel movies, the current Venom-verse spin-offs, and fellow video game adaptations Uncharted and Borderlands.
Although he’s worked on many hit films, including the two Spider-Verse films, there’s always been a question as to whether that’s because of or in spite of his input, but he certainly will have plenty of useful connections in Hollywood.
Update: According to Deadline, the scriptwriter is Derek Connolly who co-wrote Jurassic World, Kong: Skull Island, Detective Pikachu, and.. oh heavens… The Rise Of Skywalker. So, yeah, Nintendo are not necessarily assembling the best talent for this.
‘By producing visual contents of Nintendo IP by itself, Nintendo is creating new opportunities to have people from around the world to access the world of entertainment which Nintendo has built, through different means apart from its dedicated game consoles,’ said Nintendo in a statement.
‘By getting deeply involved in the movie production with the aim to put smiles on everyone’s faces through entertainment, Nintendo will continue its efforts to produce unique entertainment and deliver it to as many people as possible.’
There’s no hint of a release date but according to Nintendo, Miyamoto has already been working on the film ‘for many years’.
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