Da Vinci becomes an action hero

We had to check our calendars to make sure it wasn’t April Fool’s Day already with this one.

Warner Bros are looking to turn Leonardo Da Vinci (yeah, the artist) into a big screen, blockbusting action-adventure hero.

Still with us? Okay. Tipped as a project similar in tone to Bubba Ho-Tep and the in-production Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter , a treatment entitled Leonardo Da Vinci And The Soldiers Of Forever has been snapped up by the studio.

It comes from producer Adrian Askarieh (who steered 2007’s Hitman , oops), who is joining forces with Departed producers Roy Lee and Doug Davison to bring the concept to cinemas.

Da Vinci, obviously, is the Renaissance man/painter/inventor/architect born in 1452, who painted the Mona Lisa, and provided the inspiration for Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code .

Soldiers Of Forever reportedly “re-imagines” Da Vinci as the member of a secret society who inadvertently finds himself embroiled in a supernatural quest, and facing demons, secret codes, fallen angels and lost civilisations.

Something’s definitely happening in Hollywood at the moment, what with an explosion of sand-and-sandals epics all making their way to our screens. Not to mention a trend for reinventing some of our most famous historical figures. Must be something in the Evian.

Askarieh is scouting out a writer at the moment (any takers?). Next up: a movie that turns Florence Nightingale into a femme fatale who is really a demon-hunting-secret-agent-renegade-priness.

Daft or daring? You decide...