UPDATE 12-02-2011: Doctor Who fans can all breathe a collective sigh of relief now that Steven Moffat, current head writer and executive producer for the series, has confirmed that rumours of a “Hollywood reboot” are false.

Moffat stated via his verified Twitter account that director David Yates was speaking “off the cuff” on the red carpet and that if a Doctor Who movie were to be made, it would be done by the BBC team with the current Doctor.

In an interview with Variety, director David Yates (known for his work on the last four Harry Potter films), revealed that he will be working in conjunction with BBC Worldwide to develop a Doctor Who feature film.

The film will not star Matt Smith as the Eleventh Doctor, but will rather be an entirely new spin on the character with Yates setting aside the work of Russell T. Davies and Steven Moffatt and “start[ing] from scratch.”

Production is still in the very early stages as Yates’ has only just begun searching for writers in both the US and UK.

As bizarre as the project may initially seem, this sort of thing is not without precedent in the history of Doctor Who. Two film adaptations of Doctor Who serials were produced in the 1960s (“Doctor Who and the Daleks” and “Daleks – Invasion Earth 2150 A.D.”) starring Peter Cushing as a human inventor named “Dr. Who” that were not part of the television series canon.

Yates’ film could be a fun romp through time and space or the redheaded stepchild of the Doctor Who franchise–we’ll just have to wait and see. And with an anticipated “two or three years” to be spent in production, it looks like we’ll be waiting quite a while.

[Via: Variety]