Everybody's third favourite gay cowboy (after the recently departed Heath Ledger and the Rawhide Kid), Jake Gyllenhaal, is slated to take the lead role in the upcoming Prince of Persia film.

Gyllenhaal will play Dastan in his quest to stop a villainous nobleman from grabbing the Sands of Time, which enable their possessor to turn back the clock and, you know, rule the world... and that.

Starring opposite him will be Gemma Arterton, a Bond girl in the ridiculously named Quantum of Solace and former St. Trinians's student. She will play Tamina, a princess who is both feisty and exotic.

Mike Newell, the director behind Four Weddings and a Funeral and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, is set to sit in the big chair of the Disney/Bruckheimer film. If it performs well at the box office, it's apparently hoped that the property will become a Hollywood franchise along the lines of Pirates of the Caribbean.

Ubisoft recently confirmed a new game in the Prince of Persia series.

^{Source: E!}