James Mangold Takes On Wolverine

On leaving the new The Wolverine project, director Darren Aronofsky created not only a lot of buzz, but also some big shoes to fill, luckily, ambitious James Mangold, the director of Cop Land, Walk the Line and 3:10 to Yuma, has stepped up to the challenge. Aware of the conventions of the superhero genre, Mangold is looking towards other genres to explore the core of the character. The Playlist talked to Mangold who has clear aspirations for the film. “This is like a foreign-language superhero movie that’s as much a drama and a detective story and a film noir, with high-octane action as it is anything like a conventional tentpole film”, he explained. The plan still remains to adapt the 1982 Wolverine mini-series by Chris Claremont and Frank Miller in which Logan/ Wolverine goes to Japan where he encounters samurai action and supernatural gangsters, while managing to have a romantic fling with young Japanese woman. Mangold also expressed enthusiasm for working with Hugh Jackman who he directed in Kate & Leopold, a film which Mangold wrote and directed back in 2001. The next instalment of the Wolverine saga is set to begin shooting in spring of next year.