Presumably hoping that they can elevate the ever-flagging respectability of the video game movie, New Regency and Ubisoft continue to pack their upcoming film adaptation of Assassin’s Creed with high-profile talent. First, they hired Michael Fassbender to play the lead, a bartender forced by a mysterious corporation to relive his ancestors’ memories of stabbing people in the neck throughout history. Then they tapped Justin Kurzel, who helmed a movie version of Macbeth with Fassbender and Cotillard due out later this year, to direct, since a lot of Assassin’s Creed takes place in olden times and he probably knows how they talked back then. Now, Deadline reports that Academy Award-winning actress Marion Cotillard has signed on to play an unknown role.
Whatever that role is, she could be playing it for a while. New Regency and Ubisoft are grooming the movie, targeted for a December 21, 2016 release, to be the first in a franchise. And even if Assassin’s Creed doesn’t take off, the studios already have plans for a film version of Splinter Cell starring Tom Hardy, part of their plan to adapt video games for the big screen until the world is convinced that watching them is preferable to playing them.