Perhaps best known as the quirky man trapped in the quirky world of his own dreams in The Science of Sleep, Gael García Bernal has also found sweet, sustainable success (and awards!) as the leader of an orchestra on the Amazon Prime show Mozart in the Jungle. Still, Bernal has remained a relatively quiet presence in the United States, but that just might change with news that he’s set to be taking on the legendary role of Zorro in a new film from Jónas Cuarón, which will apparently be called Z.
Bernal and Cuaròn — son of Alfonso and co-writer of Gravity — actually worked together on his soon-to-be-released Desierto, so it’s going to be a reunion of sorts, as well as the first big budget studio film for both. This is the first Zorro film since 2005’s The Mask of Zorro, which was the second film to feature Antonio Banderas in the role. Of course, the character originated almost 100 years ago now, in 1919 when Johnston McCulley wrote him into an issue of the pulp fiction magazine Argosy All-Story Weekly.
Since then, the character has appeared in countless films and has been paid homage in various different ways, maybe most significantly (and, for sure, most recently) as the inspiration for Banderas’ animated character Puss in Boots, who is basically Zorro — only as a cat.
Anyway, as for Z, production begins later this year, so expect a release sometime in 2017, unless they plan to go ultra-futuristic with it and have the thing overflowing with CGI.
Watch the trailer for Desierto below.