From The Grid to New Manhattan
It’s been a while since Garrett Hedlund played the head-strong son of Jeff Bridges in TRON: LEGACY (2010), but it looks like he could’ve landed his next big project. After the recent rumours of Gary Oldman and Helena Bonham-Carter circling the project, the people at Warner Bros. are negotiating with Hedlund for the lead role of Kaneda in AKIRA.
WB acquired the rights for the cult Japanese Manga back in 2008, and it was finally green-lit as a major tent-pole project last week.
Set in New Manhattan (instead of the original Neo-Tokyo), the cyberpunk sci-fi epic follows the leader of a biker gang (Kaneda) who must save his friend, discovered with potentially destructive psychokinetic abilities, from government medical experiments.
Jaume Collet-Serra (UNKNOWN, HOUSE OF WAX (2005)) is on board to helm with Steve Kloves (THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN (2012)) writing the latest version of the script, and Leonardo DiCaprio on as one of the producers.
AKIRA is being filmed as a two-parter, with part one scheduled for release in 2013. Hedlund’s most recent appearance is in Walter Salles’ ON THE ROAD, which is complete but still seeking distribution
SOURCE: Variety
