Noam Murro to direct 300 prequel Battle Of Artemisia

Noam Murro will direct the 300 prequel, officially titled 300: Battle Of Artemisia , for Warner Bros.

Murro's only feature credit to date is indie drama Smart People , but he is also attached to Die Hard 5 , so the powers that be are obviously confident that he can handle action.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Warner Bros deliberated between Murro and Jaum Collet-Serra ( Unknown ) for the gig, before opting to hand the Akira remake to the latter.

A 300 spin-off has been mooted ever since Zack Snyder's Frank Miller adaptation took mega-bucks at the box office

Miller is thought to be readying a prequel to his comic book series, which is expected to be released at some point this year. It was going to be called Xerxes , but as the film has dropped that title, it wouldn't surprise us if the book followed suit.

Xerxes will come to the forefront in the new movie, as he leads the Persian army against an Athenian warlord.

Snyder was once set to direct the prequel, but it seems his Man Of Steel commitments are now prohibiting that. Snyder wrote the script with 300 's Kurt Johnstad.

There's currently no word on an expected release date.

Matt Maytum
Editor, Total Film

I'm the Editor at Total Film magazine, overseeing the running of the mag, and generally obsessing over all things Nolan, Kubrick and Pixar. Over the past decade I've worked in various roles for TF online and in print, including at GamesRadar+, and you can often hear me nattering on the Inside Total Film podcast. Bucket-list-ticking career highlights have included reporting from the set of Tenet and Avengers: Infinity War, as well as covering Comic-Con, TIFF and the Sundance Film Festival.