Akira 2011

[The NZA]

AKIRA live action details emerge: teen drama, all the "sophisticated, boring and dated parts" removed.

 

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Source in italian, translation by me

 

Il regista Gabriele Mainetti: "Vidi la sceneggiatura del live action di Akira ed era un teen movie"

 

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Gabriele Mainetti, italian director for "They Call Me Jeeg", a very good dark super hero movie/tribute to the Steel Jeeg anime, was among the first of many directors aired for the live action AKIRA movie. He hated the script and left the project. This is what he said:

 

AKIRA is great... what a masterpiece. I read the manga, I've seen the movie, I've re-read the manga, I've re-watched the movie!

[...]I did the casting for it [the AKIRA live action remake]. I went to the producer and he let me read the script. Basically they removed all the philosophical parts. It's a teen movie between two dudes, Kaneda and Tetsuo. "I have to help my friend...". There is no Kaneda fucking pissed because Tetsuo killed his friends and want to kick his ass... Now I hope to not have spoiled the movie!

 

 

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Interviewer: No it's okay, they would rewrite the script 6 times before giving to another director.

I told him I couldn't have made it like this, and I asked him: "how much margin there is to rethink it?". and they told me: "we are really happy with the script, precisely because they removed all the sophisticated, boring parts that were also a bit dated...". I replyed: "I don't think it that way." [...] It's a marvelous project, they want to make a blockbuster, it's not even that poorly written, but it's not the AKIRA we know. Maybe there is a lot of potential I can't see. So much that my agent called me and told me: "Taika is very likely to do it, but he is very curious to hear all the critics and observations." I responded "No."