Leonardo DiCaprio and Taika Waititi's Akira remake is getting $18 million to film in Neo-California
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Hollywood has spent years threatening to make a live-action adaptation of iconic anime classic Akira, and the very meanest part of this threat is always that everybody involved wants to Americanize the story and set it in some futuristic version of New York. The original movie took place in Neo-Tokyo, years after a mysterious explosion of some sort obliterated the old Tokyo, and a good chunk of it is meant to not-so-subtly evoke the aftermath of the atomic bombs that we dropped on Japan in World War II. That means transporting the story to the United States drains it of a lot of power, which is in addition to the firmly established issue of whitewashing traditionally Japanese characters in an American adaptation. Did we learn nothing from Ghost In The Shell?
Apparently nobody really listens to us—or, you know, common sense—because the American adaptation of Akira that Leonardo DiCaprio’s Appian Way studio has been sitting on for years just landed an $18.5 million tax incentive to film in California. That’s a ton of money, and it’s among the highest payouts the state has ever given out for a tentpole movie like this, so it means everybody’s counting on Akira actually getting made and being a pretty big production at that. It also means, unfortunately, that the movie just took a huge step toward actually happening and that it’ll almost definitely be set in Neo-Los Angeles when it does happen.
This all comes from Deadline, which also notes that Thor: Ragnarok’s Taika Waititi is supposedly still on board to direct—which we first heard about years ago. That may seem like a potentially good sign, because Waititi is great, but allow us to reiterate some salient points: This would be live-action remake of an anime movie from an American film studio set in an American city and possibly starring American white people. Waititi said back in 2017 that casting actual Asian teenagers “would be the way to do it,” but that doesn’t necessarily mean that it’ll be the way he gets to do it (and that’s assuming he doesn’t eventually drop out, as every other potential director has).
68 Comments
this might be taika waititi venturing where i cannot fucking follow
akira as a live action work is just so incredibly disrespectful toward the craftsmanship of the comic and the movie and also, the notion that centering akira on americans as protagonists is just so god damn arrogant and also: the concept that you could make this without utilizing the original score (and the knowledge that they will) makes me so upset this is HUBRIS.
Kill me now.
I’m going to enjoy laughing at this movie when it eventually shows up on Netflix.
Another ‘live action version of an animated classic’ that’s no doubt going to be about as off-putting as Dumbo.
*dumbo was a book
Akira was also a manga whats your point?
Funnily enough, no one complained when Akira Kurosawa made a version of Macbeth set in medieval Japan.Either way, a live-action Akira is stupid and the closest thing we’ll get to an American version is Chronicle.
Maybe I’m missing something, but if you’re going to have a Western remake of a Japanese film, what’s wrong with shifting the action to a new setting rather than replicating the original? Plenty of people think Infernal Affairs is better than The Departed, but as far as I’m aware no-one thinks Scorsese is racist because he set the story in Boston rather than Hong Kong.
Taika Waititi, though. I’ve not given up hope juuust yet.
This article is some real shite. Taika has indicated that he’s interested in making the books, not remaking the movie. He’s also indicated that he doesn’t want to whitewash it. Taika has enough stature after Thor to get his way, and he’s obviously been playing wit this movie for a year and a half. There’s absolutelt no indication that this movie will be set in the US. Its just a fearmongery hate take, but the hot take is cold. Can we get a newswriter who actually understands soft power in the film industry?
which is in addition to the firmly established issue of whitewashing traditionally Japanese characters in an American adaptation. Did we learn nothing from Ghost In The Shell?Why would you assume they should carry over the racial breakdown when they remake it? Should The Departed have been about Boston’s only all-Chinese police force? Or just inexplicably set in Hong Kong? I don’t watch the Japanese remake of Unforgiven and think to myself “they should have set this in America starring white people”.
I think, with Akira, part of the issue is that it’s so centered on the way that the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki fundamentally changed the course of Japanese history. You’re not just transplanting a crime story or replacing samurai with cowboys.
The only example I can think of would be if you changed the setting of PKD’s The Man in the High Castle to a country other than the US.
I see your point, but none of the explosions that create the world of Akira or that occur during the events of Akira are nuclear, they’re all caused by the fundamental evolutionary force or something.
Yeah, but even in the dubs, it’s easy for a casual viewer to pick up on the fact the psy-kids and the destruction of Tokyo symbolize nuclear technology, the contrast and tensions between those who grew up in pre-war and post-war Japan, and the bombings.
To me – personally – that sort of commentary is what gives a lot of classic works of genre fiction their depth. You can set Night of the Living Dead in any country, during any decade of the 20th and 21st Centuries, but you’re going but it’s not going to have the same emotional wallop as a film made during the Civil Rights era, having a black hero who (after surviving the monsters) is killed in cold blood by a group of white men.
Yeah, but even in the dubs, it’s easy for a casual viewer to pick up on the fact the psy-kids and the destruction of Tokyo symbolize nuclear technology, the contrast and tensions between those who grew up in pre-war and post-war Japan, and the bombings.
To me – personally – that sort of commentary is what gives a lot of classic works of genre fiction their depth. You can set Night of the Living Dead in any country, during any decade of the 20th and 21st Centuries, but you’re going but it’s not going to have the same emotional wallop as a film made during the Civil Rights era, having a black hero who (after surviving the monsters) is killed in cold blood by a group of white men.
I see your point, but none of the explosions that create the world of Akira or that occur during the events of Akira are nuclear, they’re all caused by the fundamental evolutionary force or something.But everybody believed that the explosion that destroyed the original Tokyo was nuclear, and it jumpstarted the World War III. It was absolutely a stand-in for a nuclear explosion.
Let’s face it, Akira the film is about a guy powersliding a motorbike and other cool visual effects. It doesn’t really carry off having themes or plotlines because it’s about twenty hours of story diced up and squeezed into about two hours. It’s just a bunch of stuff that looks cool, and is best seen dubbed into a language you don’t speak with no subtitles.
Sounds like we should get Zack Snyder to direct it
I agree that metaphor and subtext are not in any way a part of fiction, and that every time you tell a joke you should say “Dat’s da joke” in an Austrian accent, just to make sure the audience gets it.
For someone who thinks saying “that’s the joke” is something stupid you have comedic knack for having trouble spotting subtle jokes.
Also, go fuck yourself.
The main character who caused the explosion is named AKIRA, not Bob.
The fact that the “explosions” in Akira are not caused by nuclear bombs has little to do with the theme of Japanese cities being destroyed by cataclysmic events and their effect on Japanese history. We (the USA) nuked two and firebombed many more Japanese cities off the map. That had a huge effect on Japanese history, economic development and national psyche. Loads of Japanese media reference those effects.
That’s a different complaint entirely. Transplanting the story from continent to continent is finicky, no doubt about it, but that’s completely separate from the complaint about the race of the people in the shifted adaptation. It’s not like casting Asian-Americans for their 2060 California setting would do anything helpful.
Started for having an avatar that is sexually attracted to fire.
If they are remaking it Americanized, I guess they’ll change the title from Akira to Jake or Bobby or Acair or something, right?
Since we have no idea whom will be cast, it’s entirely possible (I would say probable) that Akira will be of Japanese descent.
There’s a Japanese remake of Unforgiven!!!!?
Starring Ken Watanabe, with the classic “samurai film≈cowboy film” conversion flipped around. 93% on Rotten Tomatoes.
title? Because that sounds great!
It’s still just called Unforgiven.
Uh, pedantic shit like this is the worst
I’m not sure you know what the word pedantic means.
You know most people who say stuff like that are mostly people that are still uncomfortable with seeing colored people lead big budget films.
Classic argument. “Nothing you said was racist, but I’m just going to say you’re probably racist anyway based on an unfounded hunch”, real solid logic there. It’s especially weird since that’s a pretty rare prejudice these days, it’s not like you hear a lot of racists whining about the Rock.
I don’t watch the Japanese remake of Unforgiven and think to myself “they should have set this in America starring white people”.There’s a difference between the straight remakes of a live-action film (the same happens with some French movies) which are more local adaptations (what would the point be of a Japanese remake, in Japanese, of Unforgiven using American white people anyway?) and an adaptation of an anime film that is (are, since Ghost happened as well) inextricably and culturally linked to Japanese culture and history.
(what would the point be of a Japanese remake, in Japanese, of Unforgiven using American white people anyway?Exactly. The point of a remake is to change things. I don’t think the difference between adapting a live-action film and an animated one really matters on this point. Sure, Akira is linked to Japan, but any adaptation of a foreign film has to deal with that sort of obstacle. Unforgiven draws heavily on the history of previous westerns, but they transplanted that narrative relatively smoothly. And if the movie is set in California then it loses the Japanese history linkage no matter what you do, casting non-white actors in the lead roles wouldn’t somehow change that.
I don’t think the difference between adapting a live-action film and an animated one really matters on this point.Well, I disagree. Akira is so deeply linked to Hiroshima and Nagasaki that it can only lose on the way over. GITS definitely did.As for transplanting Unforgiven smoothly, it is less surprising: Japan does have something very similar to westerns in their tradition, and that is samurai. Kurosawa among others drew on that history to basically makes films that resemble westerns.
So you post this 12 hours after the damn io9 article that’s already been updated to indicate the movie still hasn’t been greenlit?
Barsanti feeds off of the indignation and rage of his readers.
I always assumed he didn’t read the comments since he never responds to them, but you may be onto something.
I assumed he didn’t, because good writers generally tend to thrive off of feedback, but he’s been operating on the same level of dogshit quality for some time now.
Makes sense. He still thinks Shane Black directed Lethal Weapon.
So the iconic motorcycle scenes will take place in those aquaducts that were in T2?As for Asians, has anyone called Emma Stone?
Did we learn nothing from Ghost In The Shell? I thought we learned that sometimes Hollywood likes to cast popular white actors in leading roles when remaking Japanese films, and that in this case the original Japanese creator is surprisingly cool with that.
https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/ghost-in-the-shell-original-director-mamoru-oshii-scarlett-johansson-casting-whitewashing-a7650461.html
I don’t think it’s surprising, for the same reason that I’m sure when Japan adapted Spider-Man into a show with giant robots Marvel was fine with their version of Spider-Man being an Asian man.
But that Spider-Man did not have a big budget or a marketing campaign that spread through out the world. Of course they’re gonna be okay with it because it’s obscure. Plus I dont think you understand that American adaptations of animes are terrible translations of the original material. Ghost in the shell has nothing in common with the original anime film or the show and is just a poor remake of Robocop.
So you think if the Japanese Spider-Man was more successful/expensive they’d want him to be a white guy? No, of course not. Plus I dont think you understand that American adaptations of animes are terrible translations of the original material.Not really relevant to my overall point.
Oshii had no reason to give two shits. He got his money from the deal. He also didn’t give a damn when the first Ghost in the Shell film was butchered into the travesty that is Ghost in the Shell 1.5.
And what we should have learned is that popular actors is a big factor in driving movie sales. Therefore casting a white woman to play a cyborg makes financial sense (which is what movies are about).
You do remember that Ghost in the shell flopped right? Not to mention that it was a terrible adaptation to begin with. I guess white people want to be right no matter what.
Has anyone actually said it would be set in the USA? “Filmed in” and “set in” are two different things… It’s not out of the realm of possibility that something could take place in “Neo-Tokyo” and be filmed in Los Angeles.
In addition to that, I also assume that LA has ethnicities other than white people and that potentially it could involve a diverse cast…But what do I know… I’m not filled with the oblivious brand of racism that Barsanti’s articles peddle.
I love how the charitable take on Barsanti is that he’s just obliviously racist.
Meaning the good guy is still gonna be a white dude.
No, the original article makes no mention of where it will be set. This is just click-bait and I fell for it.
I know that this is a controversial opinion, but I don’t see the need for a remake of Akira.
Woah there.
I wouldn’t mind an animated miniseries that’s faithful to the manga, rather than the extremely compressed version that we got.
You know, it is possible that the movie could be filmed in California but not set in California. They could build sets and stuff. I’m reminded of how Thor: Ragnorok was filmed in Atlanta or some place, but it was set in space. I suspect you knew this when writing the article, but wrote the article anyway because you needed to write something and it needed to make me feel as though someone was committing some broader transgression against my values.
the American adaptation of Akira that Leonardo DiCaprio’s Appian Way studio has been sitting on for yearsDiCaprio’s Appian Way has a longtime habit of doing this. Very little they buy up ever actually gets made. (This is simultaneously annoying and a relief when it applies to a property you really love; I’d love to see a film of a favorite book of mine, if done well, that they bought over 10 years ago, but I absolutely do not trust Appian Way to make it well.)
They probably could’ve gotten better tax incentives shooting in CANAAAADAAAAAAAAA.
They’re not even a real country, anyway.
I love Taika Waititi’s films but I hope his take on Akira is tonally more along the lines of the original than What We Do In The Shadows. Yes I know directors can shift gears and do different things, but still.
Speaking of Anime live action…wasn’t Tobey Maguire attached to do a Robotech/Macross movie many years ago? Wonder whatever happened with that?
Looking forward to them announcing it’ll actually be a 3-part movie with an added romance subplot between Tetsuo and Kaneda (it was already kind of there, tbh) and more flashbacks to Akira’s childhood. Then, after the first movie doesn’t do as well as hoped they’ll re-tool it to only have one sequel that quietly leaves theaters after 3 weeks.
Since when does the location of a shoot have anything to do with a film’s setting? They made Ghost in the Shell in goddamn Wellington for crap’s sake, and that wasn’t set in Neo Zealand.