Zelda Movie Rumors Denied by Illumination CEO

Last week, Hollywood insider Jeff Sneider said he had on good authority that Illumination and Nintendo were in advanced talks to sign a deal to produce a Zelda movie.

However, speaking to TheWrap at the Annecy International Animation Festival, Illumination founder and CEO Chris Meledandri denied the rumor.

I don’t know where that came from. I mean, I can understand how people would surmise all sorts of things because obviously, we’ve had a great experience working together. My relationship with Nintendo now includes being on their board of directors, so I understand how people can surmise these things. But in terms of the specifics, that was just something that I’ve been hearing lots of reports. This is just about what’s next between Nintendo and Illumination.

There’s two takeaways from such a denial. On the one hand, there could genuinely be nothing going on yet regarding a Zelda movie. On the other hand, it is very much possible that Meledandri didn’t want to talk about a deal that is not official yet. As such, it is way too early to say whether the adaptation will be coming or not.

Still, given the results of the partnership between Illumination and Nintendo, chances are more IPs will be adapted. The Super Mario Bros. Movie quickly became the biggest gaming adaptation ever, but it went much further than that throughout its incredible run at the global box office. It earned over $1.3 billion, which ranks The Super Mario Bros. Movie as the third-highest grossing animated film in history (just behind The Lion King remake and Frozen II), the biggest global opening weekend of an animated film, and the current top-grossing film released in 2023 at the box office.

Nintendo also registered incredible success with the latest Zelda game, Tears of the Kingdom. Released last month for the Nintendo Switch (although it is playable via emulators on PC, too), it sold over 10 million copies globally in its first three days, making it the best-selling Zelda game to date. Tears of the Kingdom also became the fastest-selling Nintendo game ever in the United States, having sold over four million units in the USA.

Zelda performed extremely well in Japan, too, selling over 1.1 million units in those first three days. We’ll likely hear more soon about the game’s next sales milestone from Nintendo.