Brad Pitt Offered Lead role in Live-Action AKIRA film but turned it Down

Earlier today we posted an article about Mila Kunis joining Sam Raimi's Oz, The Great and Powerful. In the article it mentions how she dropped out of Albert Hughes' film adaptation of Akira to join Oz. Vulture then goes on to throw out some big crazy rumorish information that I hope is false.

According to their sources Hughes has been trying desperately to get the studio executive to let him cast the actors that he wants to cast, and bring in the best possible actors for the roles in the film, but the studio is giving him a hard time with that. Apparently the studio is pumping so much money into the movie that they want to bring in some major star power to help secure their investment.

Apparently Warner Bros. president Jeff Robinov personally called up Brad Pitt and offered him the lead role of Kaneda in the film. Two days later Pitt thankfully passed on the project.

First of all... what the hell!? Brad Pitt as Kaneda? Are they serious!? He doesn't fit the role at all! In fact he's 30 years older than the character in the story! Either the studio has a bunch of dumbasses running things, or this news is completely and utterly false. If this is the plan that Warner Bros. has for this film then fanboys and fangirls around the world are going to be pissed. And if any of this is true whose to say the film will even go into production. If this is the direction they plan on taking it then I hope the movie doesn't get made, I'd rather see the film just disappear into oblivion. 

The site reports that the one casting decision the studio allowed Hughes to make was Mila Kunis to play Kei, the gorgeous young revolutionary with whom Kaneda becomes enamored on his quest to find his disappeared best friend. Then she ended up not taking the part anyway, maybe because the movie and energy surrounding the movie is a mess, and she didn't want to deal with the drama?

It will be interesting to see who ends up getting cast in this film if it actually moves forward. What do you all think about this madness?