[caption id="attachment_150061" align="aligncenter" width="400" caption="Watanabe Ken (r.) and director Takimoto Tokiyuki"][/caption]

Today it was announced that actor Watanabe Ken is going to star in a new Toei production titled "Shouwakusei Tansaki Hayabusa - Haruka Naru Kikan".

Toei already announced the production back in January, followed by Shochiku and their announcement that they're going to work on a 3D-live-action film in February. Not too long ago, 20th Century Fox also announced another film centered around the space probe, starring actress Takeuchi Yuko. However, with a budget of 1.5 billion Yen (18.5 million USD), Toei definitely aims to deliver the best experience and entertainment among the three.

Watanabe stated about the film, for which he's not only going to worka s the leading actor but also as the project manager, "Rather than overly dramatizing the topic, we want to depict the story in a honest way."

The film is based on the Japanese unmanned spacecraft "Hayabusa", which returned to Earth last June after 7 years in space. The whole project came to a successful conclusion after a lot of challenges and struggles and seemingly provides great material for a full feature film. When the producer of Toei went to consult with the staff at the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), they revealed that they had already received offers from over eight companies.

The producer commented, "We simply have to create the best and most unique film among all the others. Last fall, with nothing to lose, we tried to ask Watanabe Ken to star in our movie and to our surprise he replied, 'Why not? Let's do it!'" Watanabe revealed that he also watched the return of the space probe with great interest on the news and therefore was quite intrigued to star in a related movie.

[caption id="attachment_150062" align="aligncenter" width="400" caption="Watanabe Ken (l.) and Prof. Kawaguchi Junichiro"][/caption]

It is said that Watanabe invited Prof. Kawaguchi Junichiro, the person he is going to play in the film, to a drink at a bar and exchanged their ideas and thoughts about the project. Rumor has it that they emptied a whole bottle of shochu (1.8 liter) that night. Watanabe was expected to further expand his career in Hollywood, but he never loses his desire to participate in Japanese productions once in a while. The desire to offer entertainment to his fellow countrymen grew even stronger after the earthquake that hit Japan in March.

He commented, "Japan as a whole has always been in a maze of trial and error. My biggest wish is to show people that we have such incredible engineers that support Japan with all their knowledge and that we should feel really proud of them."

"Shouwakusei Tansaki Hayabusa" is scheduled to open in Japan sometime in 2012.

Source: Sports Hochi