Hong Kong’s Emperor Motion Pictures and China’s Wanda Media announced they have acquired the Chinese-language film and television adaptation rights for Japanese writer Keigo Higashino’s novel Miracles of the Namiya General Store.
The film adaptation, the first of Higashino’s work to be filmed for a Chinese audience, is set to begin production next year for a 2017 release. Cast and director will be announced at a later date, the companies said.
Miracles of the Namiya General Store tells the story of three delinquents who respond to a mystery letter from the past in a dilapidated dime store.
One of the most prolific and award-winning contemporary fiction writers in Japan, Keigo Higashino has produced mystery and crime stories such as Devotion of Suspect X and Naoko that were translated and read across the globe. His 2012 novel, Miracles of the Namiya General Store, won the prestigious Chuo Koron Literary Prize in Japan and its Chinese translation has sold more than 1.6 million copies in China to date.
Many of Keigo Higashino’s novels have been adapted into films and television series in Japan, including the immensely popular Galileo series, starring Fukuyama Masaharu. Three of his works have been translated onto the screen in South Korea, including White Night, adapted from Journey Under the Midnight Sun; Perfect Number, adapted from The Devotion of Suspect X; and Broken, adapted from The Hovering Blade. A French adaptation of Naoko was made into The Secret, directed by actor Vincent Perez, in 2007.
