Deadline reports that (500) Days of Summer and The Amazing Spider-Man director Marc Webb has been tapped to helm the live-action remake of the hit Japanese anime Your Name. Paramount Pictures and Bad Robot will produce the film with Japan-based Toho Co., Ltd., the producers of the acclaimed original animated film.
In this re-imagined version, a young Native American woman living in a rural area and a young man from Chicago discover they are magically and intermittently swapping bodies. When a disaster threatens to upend their lives, they must journey to meet and save their worlds.
“Marc was our first choice to direct this refashioned interpretation of the film from the moment we explored creating an American version,” Producer Genki Kawamura said. “As we saw in (500) Days Of Summer, Marc has a tremendous talent for telling great love stories and in the same way moviegoers were captivated by the original film, we are certain Marc will engage fans of the original and an entirely new audience for these characters’ beautiful journey. With J.J. Abrams producing, Eric Heisserer writing and Marc directing, this project officially has the team we dreamed about.”
J.J. Abrams and Lindsey Weber will produce for Bad Robot, along with Kawamura. Academy Award-nominated screenwriter Eric Heisserer (Arrival) will write the screenplay.
Your Name has become the highest-grossing anime film at the worldwide box office, earning $355 million. In Japan, it earned ¥25.0 billion ($303 million) and held the top spot at the box office for a record-breaking 12 weeks (non-consecutive). The movie is also the highest-grossing Japanese film to release in China to date, earning $85.6 million.
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