Tim Van Rellim, the producer of the live action adaption of the Dragon Ball anime series conducted an interview with El Siglo, a Durango, Mexico newspaper, which was republished by Movieland and translated by Dragonball: The Movie blog. In it, he speaks about the plot of the movie (WARNING! POSSIBLE SPOILERS!) and hints to the possibility of a sequel. The translation is pretty rough so forgive any grammatical imperfections.

Tim Van Rellim reveals that Goku dies in the beginning of the second part of Dragonball

At least that’s what recently commented Tim Van Rellim, producer of Dragon Ball, in an exclusive chat in el Siglo of Durango, in which he spelled out precisely the death of the protagonist will be the beginning of the second part of the story, it it is also very likely to be recorded in Durango.

“Durango has been a phenomenal place to record. We had many sets and the truth never felt paparazzis or harassment of the press and elsewhere and in other productions. It is a very quiet place, we were treated very well, “he said.

More after the jump (more…)

DreamWorks has acquired the rights to produce a Live Action feature based on Masamune Shirow’s, Ghost In The Shell.

Ghost In The Shell ( 攻殻機動隊, Kōkaku Kidōtai ) , first published in 1989, is a futuristic police thriller dealing with the exploits of Motoko Kusanagi, a member of the covert operations section of the Japanese National Public Safety Commission, Section 9, which specializes in fighting technology-related crime. She may be named after one of the three Imperial Regalia of Japan and Shirow makes reference to them at the end of the second manga. Although supposedly equal to all other members, Kusanagi fills the leadership role in the team, and is usually referred to as “the Major” due to her past rank in the armed forces. She is capable of superhuman feats, and bionically specialized for her job — her body is almost completely mechanized; only her brain and a segment of her spinal cord are organic. [ Wikipedia ]

According to Variety, Seaside Entertainment will be producing the feature while Jamie Moss has signed on to write the script for the adaption. Universal and Sony also attempted to gain the rights to Ghost in the Shell, however, Steven Spielberg is reported to have taken great personal interest in the property, thus leading to its’ reception by DreamWorks. “Ghost in the Shell is one of my favorite stories,” Spielberg was quoted as saying. “It’s a genre that has arrived, and we enthusiastically welcome it to DreamWorks.”

There is a reason why you should not imitate what you see on TV. Sadly, 10-year-old Cody Porter (Pictured Right, Below) of Seattle, Washington learned that the hard way this past weekend.

While playing in a sandbox in his family’s backyard - along with five of his peers (including three brothers and two friends), the boy requested of them to help him recreate a scene from Naruto by burying him in the one-foot-deep sandbox, head-first, from his head to his chest.

Once he was buried, the boy was said to have been thrashing around violently. After witnessing this, his friends realized that something was wrong and called for the help of adults. Upon arrival, the adults immediately called for medical help, pulled Cody from the sand and began to administer CPR to get him breathing once more.

Cody Porter; Image: KSDK News

Medics took Cody Porter to the Children’s Hospital & Regional Medical Center located in Seattle, Washington where he is currently listed in critical condition. After interviewing the five children who were in the sandbox with Cody, the Sheriff’s department named it as a “tragic accident”.

Here is what Cody’s half brother had to say about it:

“They watch a cartoon where they were like sand masters or something and they can manipulate sand or something like that. They came up with the idea that if he were to do this then he would be able to be one of them”

Seattle ABC affiliate, KOMO-TV, did a broadcast of this story which is available online. In it, various clips of Naruto are shown with Gaara (pictured left, above) performing Sand attacks and the characters are described as “sand ninjas” (ANN).

Remember kids, Naruto is an anime, do not try and immitate the fight scenes from the show in real life.

Sources: King 5, Komo-TV (via ANN)

Papa Midnight would like to remind you that picking on people is not cool. Let’s try to be nice and let this kid have some peace, especially when he goes back to school where he’s most likely to get the brunt of his insults (save, The Internet, of course).

Update:  Cody Porter was pronounced dead Monday afternoon. No doubt there will be some idiots who are quick to say that anime is evil and should be banned, but lets hope the fallout isn’t too bad. Comments along the lines of ‘it is a good thing for the gene pool when this happens’ are a little insensitive, the kid died, so try and refrain from doing so if at all possible.

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Starlog’s Fangoria website has posted the English trailer for Viz Picture’s first Live-Action production of Death Note (デスノート ,Desu nôto).

According to Anime News Network, The trailer for the film is voiced over in English, but the movie will be released in North America with Japanese Audio and English subtitles.

About Death Note:

Death Note (デスノート, Desu Nōto?) is a series of two live-action Japanese films released in 2006 and based on the Death Note manga series by Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata. The films primarily center around a university student who decides to rid the world of evil with the help of a supernatural notebook that kills anyone whose name is written in it. The two films were directed by Shūsuke Kaneko, produced by Nippon Television and distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures Japan.

A spin-off film directed by Hideo Nakata by the name of “L: Change the WorLd” was released on February 9, 2008.

Light Yagami is a university student who resents the crime and corruption in the world. His life undergoes a drastic change when he discovers a mysterious notebook, known as the “Death Note”, lying on the ground. The Death Note’s instructions claim that, if a human’s name is written within it, that person will be killed. Light is initially skeptical of the Death Note’s authenticity, believing it is just a prank. However, after experimenting with it and killing two criminals, Light is forced to admit that the Death Note is real. After meeting with the previous owner of the Death Note, a Shinigami named Ryuk, Light seeks to become “the God of the New World” by passing his judgment on criminals.

Soon, the number of inexplicable deaths of reported criminals catches the attention of the International Police Organization and a mysterious detective known only as “L“. L quickly learns that the serial killer, dubbed by the public as “Kira” (derived from the Japanese pronunciation of the English word “Killer), is located in Japan. L also concludes that Kira can kill people without laying a finger on them. Light realizes that L will be his greatest nemesis, and a race to prove mental superiority between the two begins.

Plot Summary - Wikipedia: Death Note (film)

According to ComingSoon.net (via ANN), Twentieth Century FOX - the company producing the Live Action Dragonball movie - has delayed the theatrical release of their adaption of Akira Toriyama’s popular manga until April 3, 2009 - 9 months later than their intial projected release date of August 15, 2008.

Hopefully, this delay is a good thing and will provide FOX an opportunity to work to produce a decent Live Action adaption that will hopefully go over better than Dragonball: The Magic Begins.

We will continue to provide coverage of the details surrounding the production of Dragonball.

Between Dragon Ball and Street Fighter, there seems to be a lot of Live Action news going around lately. Courtesy of Warner Bros., we’ll be seeing a couple of Live-Action adaptions of Katsuhiro Otomo’s Akira manga series split across two films; the first of the films is set to be released in Summer 2009. Each film is set to cover 3 of the 6 volumes.

This is not the first time Warner Bros. has had to acquire rights for Akira. They previously once had the film rights for Akira, but Executive Vice-President of Warner Bros. Greg Silverman (300, Batman Begins) had to acquire them once more from Japanese publisher Kodansha post bidding which, after going around, reached seven figures.

Set to direct the film will be Ireland’s Ruairi Robinson alongside Gary Whitta (Book of Eli) who will be writing the script. No information as to the cast has been made available.

Source: ANN

Update: According to Anime UK News,  Leonardo DiCaprio, who not only has signed on as a producer, will also be joining the cast as Kaneda. In addition, as opposed to being set in New-Tokyo, this film will be set in “New Manhattan” (”A metropolis that was rebuilt after being destroyed 31 years earlier”). While we shall express that these reports remain unconfirmed (Anime UK News provides no source), we’ll leave it to those in our comment section to express their reactions to these developments.

The cast of the new Street Fighter live action production, Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li, is beginning to round out. Just to be clear before I begin, I am referring to the names of individuals by the names of their American ports as that is how they were listed. Therefore, when I say Balrog, I am not referring to the Spaniard.

Anyway, somehow, Kristen Kreuk (Euro Trip, Smallville) has been cast as Chun-Li herself. Not quite sure what they’ll do about those thighs though.

Michael Clark Duncan (Armageddon, Daredevil) will be taking on the role of Balrog. I would find it very interesting to see how that plays out.

Chris Klein (American Pie, Rollerball) will be joining them by taking on the role of Charlie (that’s Nash for all you guys who are about to criticize me for not using their Japanese names).

Rick Yune (The Fast and the Furious) will be playing the role of the only man to survive the Shun-Goku-Satsu (瞬獄殺, literally: Instant Hell Murder, a.k.a. The Raging Demon by many of those across the Pacific), Gen. Accompanying him will be Taboo from The Black Eyed Pea, Edmund Chen, Cheng Pei Pei (Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon), and Moon Bloodgood (Journeyman).

Source: Kotaku

Japanator has pointed out a pretty badass fan made live-action Dragonball Z video. Maybe these guys should be making the new Dragonball movie instead of Fox?

That’s right! According to a poster we just got from our favorite Spanish blog, there has been a casting call issued for the Dragonball Live Action movie. My understanding of Spanish is somewhat limited but from what I can ascertain, the target is anyone living near the filming area in Mexico whom can make it to the Best Western hotel addressed below at the dates listed below. According to the blog, they require a total 1,500 extra’s.

Emmy Rossum, who plays Bulma in the upcoming Dragonball Movie, has made a post on her MySpace blog where she talks a little about the set, her fellow actors, and some other random stuff (like rabbits).

I’m happy to report I’m finding little bits of time on set in between takes to write you. Today we woke up in Torreon, a pretty big city in Mexico, at about 4:30am. We drove an hour to set, just outside Dunas de Bilbao. Our location is, what I can only describe as, a sand dune desert. I’ve been riding the motorcycle in 4-foot sand drifts since sunrise to get the shot just right. The wonderful, kind and talented Chow Yun Fat is hanging on for dear life in back. We’ve been doing about 40mph, and over bumpy sand dunes that is enough to make anyone a little queasey…

You can view the whole entry here.

Source: SuperHeroFlix