Nintendo‘s The Legend of Zelda video game franchise is getting a live-action movie adaptation, which is already set to start development. It will be co-produced by the Nintendo Representative Director Shigeru Miyamoto and Avi Arad, the chairman of Arad Productions and formerly founder and CEO of Marvel Studios. It will be directed by Wes Ball, best known for directing the Maze Runner movie trilogy.
The Legend of Zelda live-action movie will be co-produced by Nintendo and Arad Productions, with Sony Pictures Entertainment in charge of the worldwide distribution. It will be co-financed by Nintendo and Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc, with Nintendo contributing more than 50% of the funding.
Miyamoto’s comment:
This is Miyamoto. I have been working on the live-action film of The Legend of Zelda for many years now with Avi Arad-san, who has produced many mega hit films.
I have asked Avi-san to produce this film with me, and we have now officially started the development of the film with Nintendo itself heavily involved in the production. It will take time until its completion, but I hope you look forward to seeing it.
In the press release announcing the movie, Nintendo wrote:
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.
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.
The Legend of Zelda is a video game franchise created by Japanese game designers Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka. Most of the games for the franchise were developed and published by Nintendo, with some installments and re-releases being outsourced. It broke new ground with The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, which released in 2017 for the Nintendo Switch and Wii U. It introduced open world gameplay to the Legend of Zelda universe and received huge recognition and praise. Breath of the Wild is also the top selling game in the series and one of the best-selling video games of all time, having sold over 28 million copies by 2022. Its sequel, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, sold 10 million units in three days and set a record for the franchise.
Source: Nintendo
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