Johnny Depp is in talks to play Harry Houdini in an adventure movie that will reimagine the famous magician as an investigator of the occult, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

The new film, which currently has the title The Secret Life of Houdini: The Making of America's First Superhero, is said to be in the vein of the Indiana Jones movies. Red 2's Dean Parisot is tipped to direct from a screenplay by Noah Oppenheim, based on the similarly titled book by William Kalush and Larry Sloman.

Amazon says the "groundbreaking biography … vividly details the passions that drove Houdini to perform ever-more-dangerous feats, his secret life as a spy, and a pernicious plot to subvert his legacy". The site adds: "Initiating the reader along the way into the arcane world of professional magic, Kalush and Sloman decode a life based on deception, providing an intimate and riveting portrayal of Houdini, the man and the legend."

Houdini would join a cavalcade of famous figures, both mythical and historical, portrayed by Depp on the big screen. The US actor has starred as Lewis Carroll's Mad Hatter in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland, played the demon barber of Fleet Street in Sweeney Todd for the same director, and taken on the role of Tonto in last year's poorly received revival of The Lone Ranger. He has also portrayed the maverick journalist Hunter S Thompson in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Roald Dahl's Willie Wonka in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and John Dillinger in Michael Mann's Public Enemies, among other roles.

Harry Houdini in 1912, ahead of his Hudson river stunt. Photo: Fpg/Getty Images

Previous actors to have played Houdini include Tony Curtis in a 1953 biopic, Harvey Keitel in 1987's FairyTale: A True Story, Guy Pearce in 2007's Death Defying Acts and Adrien Brody in a miniseries due later this year.

Depp will next shoot sequels to two of his best-known films, the as-yet-untitled fifth Pirates of the Caribbean movie and Through the Looking Glass, the second instalment in Burton's current reimagining of Wonderland. According to the Hollywood Reporter, the story of Houdini's adventures may yet be filmed prior to either of the above.