‘Legend of Zelda’ Live-Action Film Officially In the Works
Nintendo has announced they are officially developing a live-action Legend of Zelda film, which they will be co-financing with Sony Pictures (although Nintendo will keep a majority stake in the project). Sony will distribute.
Wes Ball, who directed The Maze Runner and is behind the upcoming Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes will direct the feature, with Derek Connolly (Jurassic World, Detective Pikachu) writing. Shigeru Miyamoto is producing for Nintendo, and Avi Arad is producing for Arad Productions in his deal with Sony. Miyamoto posted the following on Twitter/X:
“I have been working on the live-action film of The Legend of Zelda for many years now with Avi Arad, who has produced many mega hit films.
I have asked Avi 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.”
The pairing between Sony and Nintendo is certainly interesting, especially in the wake of Universal’s $1.3B success story with Super Mario Bros., and rumors of a potential “big deal” between both companies for the rights to Legend of Zelda. The video game franchise launched its latest installment earlier this year with Tears of the Kingdom, which got a ton of love from the gaming community.
No release date has been announced, though Ball has still a few more months to go until Apes wraps, so he probably won’t commit to the project until next summer. Assuming a 2025 shoot, we’re looking at 2026 by the earliest. Ball himself posted on social media:
“Since I could never even hope to have the chance to direct it… the next big mo-cap Avatar-like movie should be… THE LEGEND OF ZELDA.”
Since I could never even hope to have the chance to direct it… the next big mo-cap Avatar-like movie should be… THE LEGEND OF ZELDA.
— Wes Ball (@wesball) January 29, 2010
Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is The Lord of the Rings, but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as authors like Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.
