In a stunning turn of events, Ayumi Hamasaki has confirmed her appearance in a minor but vital role in Batman Begins 2 after being approached by the film producers, and director Christopher Nolan. The J-pop queen is set to appear in the Batman Begins sequel as the enigmatic Lady Shiva.
The film, which follows 1993's Knightfall saga, is about a supervillain, Bane, sending one villain after another to wear Batman out and weaken him. Succeeding in his plan, Bane managed to break Batman's back in a confrontation, leaving Bruce Wayne crippled, and having to choose an assassin, Jean-Paul Valley, to take up his mantle as the new Batman. The new Batman defeated Bane and became increasingly violent and unbalanced.
Meanwhile, being healed of his broken spine, Bruce Wayne went to Lady Shiva, a deadly Japanese assassin, to retrain him and get him back to his physical prime, so that he can confront his chosen successor. After the phenomenal success of Nakashima Mika's film debut, Nana, (which became the top-grossing film in Japan in 2005), Ayumi Hamasaki will most probably accept this offer.
Nolan had mentioned that numerous asian actresses, including the likes of Zhang Ziyi, Michelle Yeoh and Lucy Liu, had contacted him for the role, but he didn't want to follow the footsteps of the 'vastly disappointing' Memoirs of Geisha by casting Chinese people in Japanese roles, thus he decided to cast Hamasaki as Lady Shiva as she 'has the right looks and age, most of all, her shrill voice is perfect for the screaming and yelling in fighting scenes, and her eyes are so freaking huge that they can stare right through anyone's soul'.
Ayumi is currently taking English lessons to prepare herself for this role. Shooting will commence on July.
Finally, Nolan admits that the one who really convinced him to approach Ayumi for the role was a genius Malaysian indie writer filmmaker, Edmund Yeo (22), who showed him the Voyage music video, which, according to Nolan, reduced both men into tears. Nolan knew immediately that Ayumi was perfect for this 'poignant role' as Lady Shiva.
In fact, Nolan was so grateful that he agreed to appear in Edmund Yeo's annual April Fool prank in Jpopmusic.com. Like the this 'Hikki getting divorce' news back in 2003, and this 'Hikki is Pregnant' news back in 2004. (unfortunately, last year's prank, the one about BoA getting married, is lost forever)
Sources:[b]
http://www.jpopmusic.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=62047
[b]
http://swiftywriting.blogspot.com/