ANN has reported that yesterday at Otakon 2009, legendary Anime industry veteran Noboru Ishiguro (famous for directing "The SuperDimension Fortress Macross" (1982) and creating the "Megazone 23" saga) had revealed that a Japanese live-action movie based on the legendary Space Adventure Anime classic "Space Battleship Yamato" (known in North America as "Star Blazers") is currently in development stage. Although a release has not yet been confirmed, Ishiguro also announced that SMAP group member Takuya "KimiTaku" Kimura will be playing the film's lead role.

Keep in mind that this is not first time a live-action "Space Battleship Yamato" movie is being planned. For years ago, Tab Murphy wrote for U.S. film studio Walt Disney Pictures, a script for a U.S. live-action movie based on the same Anime source in which the protagonal ship (that's Yamato) was to be called Arizona, but for reasons unknown to us, the studio's plans to produce such a film were aborted. Furthermore, Benderspink (the U.S. production company behind "American Pie" (1999)) is currently working on plans for another attempt to create and produce a live-action adaptation of the classic Anime itself.

6:13 PM Canada EST