Surely others besides me of a certain age fondly remember STAR BLAZERS from growing up in the 80's. Back in the late '90s, Disney acquired the rights to make a Star Blazers film but it never happened (and I'm glad because it would have been an all-American crew manning the rebuilt USS Arizona.)
The Japanese finally got it together and made a live action SPACE BATTLESHIP YAMATO feature film for release in December 2010 in Japan. It looks as close to the cartoon as you can possibly make it, and it's a very Japanese space opera to begin with, so I'm glad Japan tackled adapting one of their seminal anime first. I can't wait to see this thing when it hits DVD.
Reasons to watch... - Jean Smart You can probably stop right there, but there's more... - Not only do you get to SEE Jennifer Esposito, but you don't have to mute your TV when she's onscreen (bonus)