Naruto Live-Action Movie Gets Update From Spider-Man Director With Global Casting Search

The director behind Spider-Man: Brand New Day is taking on Naruto next, and has shared a major update to help kick off the global casting search for the new live-action movie’s stars. We’ve seen an increase in live-action anime and manga adaptations in the last few years specifically, but there are a few now in development projects that fans are most curious to see come to fruition. One of these projects has taken a huge step forward at last, and now fans will start to see it come together more and more.

Five years after it was first announced to be in development, Shueisha and Lionsgate Pictures have officially announced that production is now moving forward on a live-action feature film adaptation for Masashi Kishimoto’s massive Naruto manga franchise. A casting process is looking all over the globe for its central stars, and director Destin Daniel Cretton shared a special message with fans on Instagram to help celebrate everything moving forward.

Naruto Live-Action Movie Director Shares Update With Creator

“Kishimoto-sensei’s stories have inspired generations of fans around the globe, and it’s an honor to bring his world and characters to the big screen in live action for the very first time,” Cretton said about the start of production on the new live-action Naruto film. “I’m thrilled to kick off this worldwide casting search for our Team 7 and to bring the incredible universe of NARUTO to life.” It’s been confirmed that the search for its three main characters will span across the globe for the young actors at the center of it all.

Filling out Team 7 will be Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura, and future cast and characters will be revealed at a later date. It’s yet to be confirmed whether or not other cast members will be found through a worldwide casting process like this, but it’s clear that those behind the scenes are putting a lot of effort into finding the right people for such important roles. Considering how big of an endeavor this truly is for the Naruto franchise, it’s not exactly a production that can be taken lightly as we’ve seen with efforts like Netflix’s One Piece and Avatar: The Last Airbender series.

What to Know for Naruto’s Live-Action Movie Debut

Spider-Man: Brand New Day, Wonder Man, and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings director Destin Daniel Cretton will be directing the new live-action Naruto movie for Lionsgate Pictures. He will also be co-writing the film together with Tasha Huo. Cretton is also a co-producer on the film alongside Jeyun Munford through Hisako with Avi Arad, Ari Arad and Emmy Yu of Arad Productions, and Jeremy Latcham. It’s still yet to be revealed when Naruto will be make its big screen debut, let alone start filming however.

The Naruto franchise as a whole is kind of in a holding pattern for now as its sequel anime series, Boruto: Naruto Next Generations, has been on hiatus for a few years at this point with no signs of returning anytime soon. There is an official revival Naruto anime with four episodes, but it’s also showing no signs of premiering. Originally scheduled to release a few years ago, it was hit with an indefinite delay with no newly scheduled release date as of this time.

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