Onimusha Movie, Based on Capcom video game, Slashing Its Way to Theaters in 2009

The hit Capcom video game franchise Onimusha is set to begin filming in China early next year with a release date planned for December of 2009, according to a report from Screendaily International coming out of the Cannes Film Festival.

Christophe Gans will be teaming up again with Samuel Hadida's Davis Films to direct the Onimusha Movie. The two worked together previously on the successful Silent Hill movie that earned over $20M domestically on its opening weekend and nearly doubled its $50M production budget worldwide, according to figures released by Box Office Mojo.

In an interview from Screendaily International, Gans had this to say about helming the Onimusha movie project: "I have loved the Onimusha story for years and am overjoyed to have the opportunity now to bring it to life for worldwide film audiences and to access the unparalleled film resources of China to do so on the scale that the story demands."

The Onimusha movie it set to have at least a $70M budget.

"I have worked with Christophe (Gans) on three successful productions and am confident that he brings the ideal vision to realize this incredible story," said Hadida about tapping Christophe Gans to direct the film in the aforementioned story from Screendaily International.

The Onimusha video games have been long running best sellers on the Sony Playstation game systems. They are about the 16^th century samurai title character Onimusha, who is destined to protect mankind from hordes of demons that are prophesied to invade the world. Onimusha is known for its epic storylines that blend historical elements of feudal Japan with fictitious characters, fantasy, magic and insane action sequences.

While shopping the film to prospective movie studios in Cannes, Hadida offered the following to Screendaily International, "There is nothing else in the marketplace like Onimusha. It combines swashbuckling adventure, passion, and heroic destiny on an epic scale."

The duo of Leslie Kruger and John Collee (who also wrote the Master and Commander script) are currently writing the screenplay for the film.