Tag: Neill Blomkamp

Posted on in Film News, News

‘They Found Us’: Neill Blomkamp’s Alien Abduction Thriller Starring Joel Kinnaman Shuts Down Just Before Filming Starts

A majority of Hollywood productions are being paused due to the SAG-AFTRA strike and its extension due to the AMPTP walking away from the recent round of negotiations. Other smaller features have been to move forward or have found workarounds like hiring non-SAG actors or getting union exemptions. Director Neill Blomkamp (“Gran Turismo”) was set to begin shooting an alien abduction thriller titled “They Found Us” with Swedish-American actor Joel Kinnaman (“Silent Night”) set to play a father who takes his daughter camping in the Utah wilderness only to be attacked by a hostile alien and fight this beastly creature to avoid being abducted to a terrifying alien world.

There is now a report from Deadline that the film, currently in pre-production, has paused its prep stage ahead of principal photography in Saudi Arabia and was backed up by AGC Studios. It isn’t expected to get back up and running until a rework of its finance structure. This is the same studio that was recently behind Richard Linkleter’s buzzy hitman comedy “Hit Man” starring Glen Powell and Adria Arjona.

“The move to restructure the finance plan behind the independent movie comes just as tension in the region is growing due to the Israel-Gaza crisis.”

“They Found Us” has a script that hails from screenwriter Jeremy Slater, who previously worked on Netflix’s “The Umbrella Academy” and Marvel’s “Moon Knight.”

AGC made the following statement to Deadline:

“We’ve taken the reluctant decision with our valued partners at Neom to pause pre-production on the film while we further explore a cross-border legal and funding structure that makes all stakeholders comfortable. In deciding when to resume pre-production we’ll obviously assess what impact macro events in the region may have on obtaining production insurances and travel plans. Our friends at Neom and Yellow Camel have been nothing but collaborative and reliable partners at every stage of the journey thus far and we look forward to returning to prep on the film with them at the earliest sensible opportunity.”

Given that it wasn’t set to begin shooting for weeks/months it could allow enough time to get things ironed out without any major disruption. Then again, plenty of films have gone on hiatus just before filming and just simply never ended up happening. Some of the previous Blomkamp projects that ended up not getting in front of cameras include “Alien 5,” “RoboCop Returns,” and a live-action “Halo” film at 20th Century Fox that was going to be produced by Peter Jackson.

Blomkamp, of course, is no stranger to the world of sci-fi and aliens as his first big feature film “District 9” focused on stranded alien refugees in South Africa alongside “Elysium” and “Chappie” set squarely within the cyberpunk genre exploring different angles of artificial intelligence and highly advanced technologies.

SOURCE: DEADLINE

Posted on in Film News, News

‘Alien 5’: Neill Blomkamp Suggests Ridley Scott’s Reaction To ‘Chappie’ May Have Led To Cold Feet

While director Neill Blomkamp was able to convince both actress Sigourney Weaver and Aliens director James Cameron (called the film’s outline/idea “gangbusters”) about his pitch for Alien 5, but it sounds like Ridley Scott was ultimately the harder sell and may have ultimately led to the project’s death.

During a recent interview with The Playlist, Blomkamp suggested that Ridley Scott was possibly behind his exit from the sci-fi sequel.

“At the end of the day even though Ridley Scott is producing it, he brought that to the world, so if he changes his mind or if there is a director on it he doesn’t want, whatever it may be, it’s his. I understand that, it makes logical sense to me.”

Blomkamp further alluded to The Guardian that Alien 5 producer Ridley Scott (current gatekeeper of the Alien franchise) potentially watched Chappie and that may have behind Scott changing his mind about letting Blomkamp direct Alien 5 (a project Ridley Scott tried to make 20 years ago).

“It’s possible that Ridley watched Chappie and he was like, this guy can’t do Alien so let’s just go ahead and move on.”

When asked if he’d return to the franchise anytime in the future he declined that as a possibility and quickly debunked online rumblings that Alien 5 was back on track with his involvement.

“Not after, no no no, there’s no coming back from that. I’m not gonna work on a film for two years and have the rug pulled out from underneath me and then go hang out and have beers. It’s exactly why I don’t want to do IP based on other people’s stuff ever again.”

“I’m sure they will make many films with that piece of IP, it just doesn’t include me.”

It’s worth noting that as soon as Alien 5 got nixed by Scott/20th Century Fox, they quickly moved forward with Scott’s Alien: Covenant. There is a good chance that Scott saw Alien 5 as a competing film to Covenant and decided to curb-stomp it (considering his high status at the studio). There were some similarities between the two films with multiple androids as revealed in concept artwork (one good and one bad), and we wouldn’t be terribly shocked if Covenant lifted other elements from Alien 5.

Chappie was both a critical and box office disaster for Blomkamp. The sci-fi movie had multiple oddball choices including giving large roles to non-actors Die Antwoord (rapper pals of Blomkamp), who played awful characters that were on par with Hugh Jackman’s villain but were supposed to be “likable.” It certainly had less to say than the social commentary infused into the story as Blomkamp’s prior two movies District 9 and Elysium, feeling like more of “this would be cool if we did this” exercise.

With District 10 in development and other Elysium films on table, I don’t think we can say that the director has any interest in Chappie follow-ups anytime soon.

CHAPPIE – In the near future, a mechanized police force patrols the streets and deals with lawbreakers — but now, the people are fighting back. When one police droid is stolen and given new programming, he acquires the ability to feel and think for himself. While the robot, dubbed “Chappie (Sharlto Copley),” puzzles out human behavior, the authorities begin to see him as a danger to mankind and order; they will stop at nothing to ensure that Chappie is the last of his kind.

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN & THE PLAYLIST

Posted on in Film News, News

Neill Blomkamp Still Wants To Make More ‘Elysium’ Movies: Will He Make His Kruger Spinoff?

Neill Blomkamp is back to making movies after a hiatus after multiple projects not coming together (Alien 5, RoboCop Returns, Greenland), focusing on his Oats Studios shorts, and attempting to put together a new original project, Inferno.

The filmmaker is currently developing District 10, a sequel to his debut film District 9. That isn’t the only sci-fi project he wants to return to explore. While promoting his new movie Demonic, he spoke with The Playlist on their podcast and briefly voiced his desire to return to the world of Elysium.

“I would love to do more films in the world of Elysium. I love the setup of that world. The world that it puts forward is very interesting to me.”

ELYSIUM – In the year 2154, humanity is sharply divided between two classes of people: The ultrarich live aboard a luxurious space station called Elysium, and the rest live a hardscrabble existence in Earth’s ruins. His life hanging in the balance, a man named Max (Matt Damon) agrees to undertake a dangerous mission that could bring equality to the population, but Secretary Delacourt (Jodie Foster) vows to preserve the pampered lifestyle of Elysium’s citizens, no matter what the cost.

We already have idea what he’d like to tackle in follow-up.

In 2016, Neill Blomkamp mentioned to Empire the idea of revisiting the Agent Kruger character in a low-budget spinoff, a violent mercenary (played by District 9’s Sharlto Copley) that is hired to do the dirty work for Elysium. He eventually turned into main antagonist of the original film once Jodie Foster’s character was killed-off.

“I did ask [Media Rights Capital?] who paid for Elysium, I was like ‘what if you did a lower budget of this where Kruger is the lead character and is absolutely non-arc, don’t expect the character to to arc, he just doesn’t, he just does a bunch of shit that’s awesome’ and he was like ‘that does sound like that could be cool.'”

It’ll be interesting to see if he’ll tackle a Kruger-focused prequel or a direct sequel.

You can listen to that full interview below.

SOURCE: THE PLAYLIST

Posted on in Film News, News

Neill Blomkamp Says ‘District 10’ Has A Connection To American History

Filmmaker Neill Blomkamp hasn’t much luck trying to put together a big studio film as he exited a string of movies he tried to develop such a purposed “Alien 5 (second incarnation) starring Sigourney Weaver, a direct sequel to the original RoboCop with “RoboCop Returns,” and most recently he was the original director of “Greenland before Ric Roman Waugh was brought on. 

Blomkamp has been not-so-quietly developing a sequel to his big hit film, District 9, with his co-writer and wife Terri Tatchell (“District 9,” “Chappie“) and has given us an update of sorts. 

The original sci-fi film produced by Peter Jackson was an obvious allegory to South Africa’s apartheid, and it looks like “District 10” will continue that political/sociological edge to it as the filmmaker revealed to IGN during an interview this month the film will focus on “a topic in American history.”

Aliens, referred to with the slur “prawn,” arrived in South Africa thirty years ago, and when they are relocated out of the slum things go bad quickly. Sharlto Copley‘s Wikus van de Merwe dowses himself with alien fuel that eventually transforms him into an alien and is made assurances that if he helps another alien get to the main ship, he’ll return with the technology to turn him back into a human. 

Blomkamp continued, “That script continues to be written. It’s looking good. It took a decade to figure out, to come up with a reason why to make that film as opposed to just make a sequel.”

It’s possible that the treatment of Native Americans or African-Americans could be the crux of the sequel, but that is pure speculation based on the last film spotlighting European colonialism.

His next release will be the horror flick Denomic and may end up returning to complete Inferno starring fellow Canadian Taylor Kitsch.

DISTRICT 9 – Thirty years ago, aliens arrive on Earth — not to conquer or give aid, but — to find refuge from their dying planet. Separated from humans in a South African area called District 9, the aliens are managed by Multi-National United, which is unconcerned with the aliens’ welfare but will do anything to master their advanced technology. When a company field agent (Sharlto Copley) contracts a mysterious virus that begins to alter his DNA, there is only one place he can hide: District 9.

SOURCE: IGN

Posted on in Film News

‘Alien’ Series Creator Noah Hawley Wanted To Watch Neill Blomkamp’s ‘Alien 5’ Movie; “I Would Have Paid Money To See That”

There has been lots of fantastic artwork from Niell Blomkamp’s Alien 5 aka Red Harvest making the rounds online thanks to concept artist Geoffroy Thoorens (new concept art pictured above). It looks like the former Blomkamp project is getting some support from another creative working within the Alien franchise.

Deadline sat down with Fargo’s Noah Hawley and the subject of his new Alien series was brought up, but he wasn’t dishing details. However, when talking about the franchise’s legacy of directors, Noah mentioned that he wanted to have seen Neill Blomkamp’s unmade Alien 5 starring Sigourney Weaver in the Ellen Ripley role. A sequel that would have acted as a direct companion to James Cameron’s Aliens, resurrecting characters that died early on in David Fincher’s Alien 3.

“For five minutes Neill Blomkamp was going to make an Alien movie, I would have paid money to see that,” Hawley told Deadline during a video podcast chat.

As far as we know, Neill Blomkamp doesn’t have a desire to return after 20th Century Fox pulled-the-plug to make Ridley Scott’s lackluster Alien: Covenant. Scott has mentioned in previous interviews that he’s speaking with the studio about a third prequel film and is attached as a producer on the new streaming series led by Hawley.

SOURCE: DEADLINE

Posted on in Film News

‘Alien 5’: More Ellen Ripley Concept Art Appears Online From Neill Blomkamp’s Unmade Sequel

Filmmaker Neill Blomkamp (District 9, Chappie, Elysium) famously attempted to put together a new Alien sequel with Sigourney Weaver back in the Ellen Ripley role. Alien 5 aka Red Harvest seemingly would have acted as a direct sequel to James Cameron’s Aliens and ignoring the events of Alien 3/Alien Resurrection allowing them to bring back Hicks and Newt.

Previous concept art revealed that the evil Weyland-Yuanti got their hands on the derelict ship and are breeding xenomorphs in some sort of controlled facility.

Another small batch of concept artwork appeared on the website of artist Geoffroy Thoorens. It shows Ripley wearing a fireproof suit and an image of a space station.

The suit worn by Ripley was actually developed by Alien: Isolation and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker concept artist Calum Alexander Watt. You can see one of his designs for the suit below.

SOURCE: GEOFFROY THOORENS

Posted on in Film News

Concept Art From Neill Blomkamp’s Unmade ‘Alien 5’ Features A New Android Character

Neill Blomkamp’s Alien 5 aka Red Harvest was once an elevator pitch made to Sigourney Weaver on the set of Chappie alongside a wave of concept art the filmmaker had commissioned on his own that materialized into an actual development deal with 20th Century Fox to make the sci-fi film.

Blomkamp’s idea was to ignore Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection treating Alien 5 as a direct sequel to Aliens, allowing them to have characters such as Michael Biehn’s Hicks and an adult version of Newt (the two characters spotted in concept artwork). If you missed David Fincher’s Alien 3 that movie opened by killing-off both Hicks and Newt something that frustrated fans and Aliens director James Cameron.

James Cameron famously called the Alien 5 script “gangbusters” (Cameron seemingly borrowed Alien 5’s concept for Terminator: Dark Fate) but the project ultimately didn’t get into the production phase as the studio pivoted to making Ridley Scott’s Alien: Covenant instead. Alien 5 would eventually be trust into limbo with Blomkamp exiting to pursue multiple other projects and Disney hasn’t suggested they plan on resurrecting it anytime soon.

However, a new batch of Alien 5 concept from artist Geoffory Thoorens’ Art Station page has been spotted by AVP Galaxy and it features a new android characters named Jax (fist image seen below with Ellen Ripley) and Killson, the latter looks a lot like Wolverine actor Hugh Jackman (second image seen below). I’m sort of curious if Neill Blomkamp wanted to have Jackman play one of the androids, the Australian actor was the face of 20th Century Fox’s popular X-Men franchise at the time and had recently worked with Blomkamp on Chappie that also co-starred Weaver.

Hugh Jackman as Killson?

UPDATE: Geoffroy’s website includes this stunning key frame image from an action sequence that features an alien queen and another type of xenomorph (Alien 5 was going to feature multiple hybrid xenomorphs). The film would have seen the evil corporation Weyland-Yutani getting their hands on one of the derelict ships filled with xenomorph eggs and finally experimenting on the dangerous alien species for their weapons division, something they’ve been trying to do since the original Ridley Scott film.

The Alien franchise is in odd place as a new television series set on Earth is in the works from Noah Hawley (Fargo, Legion) and Ridley Scott. There has been chatter from Ridley that he’s developing another film as well, but those plans have yet to be officially announced by the studio.

SOURCE: GEOFFROY THOORENS

Posted on in Film News

Neill Blomkamp Teases Interest In Making A ‘Starship Troopers’ Movie

Today, we learned that District 9 director Neill Blomkamp is working on a script for a sequel to his debut sci-fi action film, titled District 10. That’s not the only thing he teased on Twitter. A fan asked him if he’d make a Starship Troopers film and candidly seemed to agree with him with “I’ll do it”, while dismissing someone else’s call to do something in the Star Wars universe.

https://twitter.com/NeillBlomkamp/status/1365163570472701952
https://twitter.com/NeillBlomkamp/status/1365164612472070147

Interestingly, a Starship Troopers reboot was announced back in 2016 at Sony Pictures as first revealed by The Hollywood Reporter. The bad news was that producer Neal H. Moritz is attached, who was behind the horribly generic PG-13 remakes of RoboCop and Total Recall. Along with the screenwriters behind the long forgotten Baywatch movie.

Five years later and there really hasn’t been a concrete update on the project.

Starship Troopers was based on the novel by Robert A. Heinlein, the book helped inspire James Cameron’s Colonial Marines in Aliens and Microsoft’s Halo franchise. It landed a Japanese anime, feature film from director Paul Verhoeven released in 1997, a kids CGI animated series, multiple low-budget film sequels, and animated projects.

It’s worth mentioning the Blomkamp hasn’t had the best luck when trying to turn existing IP into feature films as he was originally set to make his film debut with 20th Century Fox’s Halo film before pivoting to District 9. More recently he exited 20th Century Fox’s Alien 5 (a direct sequel to James Cameron’s Aliens) and MGM Studios’ RoboCop Returns (a direct sequel to Paul Verhoeven’s original) before moving on to his own stuff.

Neill would certainly be a strong pick for a new Starship Troopers film and given the lack of status updates from Sony it doesn’t sound like they’re about get that earlier reboot incarnation into production anytime soon. Then again, tweeting interest doesn’t mean it will come together but teasing stuff on social media is how Blomkamp eventually got a development deal for Alien 5 at Fox.

STARSHIP TROOPERS – In the distant future, the Earth is at war with a race of giant alien insects. Little is known about the Bugs except that they are intent on the eradication of all human life. But there was a time before the war… A Mobile Infantry travels to distant alien planets to take the war to the Bugs. They are a ruthless enemy with only one mission: Survival of their species no matter what the cost…

SOURCE: NEILL BLOMKAMP

Posted on in Film News

‘District 9’ Sequel ‘District 10’ Currently Being Written According To Neill Blomkamp

Fans of Neill Blomkamp’s debut film District 9 have been patiently waiting for a sequel as the end of original film finished on a cliffhanger on the promise of Wikus being transformed back into a human.

The filmmaker has revealed on Twitter that they’ve started work on the sequel’s script with himself, his wife Terri Tatchell (co-wrote the original) and Sharlto Copley working on it.

https://twitter.com/NeillBlomkamp/status/1365167374421225473

It’s unknown at this point if Peter Jackson’s WingNut Films or Sony Pictures will be involved. We know that Neill had a falling out with the head of Sony Pictures, Tom Rothman, over the failed film adaptation of Halo when Tom was the head of 20th Century Fox. Blomkamp stopped working with Sony Pictures conveniently around the same time Rothman joined the studio and attempted to make Alien 5 at Rothman’s former studio 20th Century Fox.

DISTRICT 9 – Thirty years ago, aliens arrive on Earth — not to conquer or give aid, but — to find refuge from their dying planet. Separated from humans in a South African area called District 9, the aliens are managed by Multi-National United, which is unconcerned with the aliens’ welfare but will do anything to master their advanced technology. When a company field agent (Sharlto Copley) contracts a mysterious virus that begins to alter his DNA, there is only one place he can hide: District 9.

SOURCE: NEILL BLOMKAMP

Posted on in Television News

The Live-Action ‘Halo’ Series Moves From Showtime To Paramount+

Deadline has revealed that the Halo series has been moved from Showtime to streaming service Paramount+. The upcoming series is, of course, based on the beloved sci-fi shooter from Xbox and will be produced by Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Television.

Halo‘s long road to the small screen has taken one final turn. Showtime’s anticipated series based on the hugely popular Xbox video game franchise will migrate to Paramount+ and be available exclusively on ViacomCBS’ streamer. The announcement will be made during the ViacomCBS Streaming Event this afternoon.

We should get more information on the show’s move to Paramount+ later today.

UPDATE: The Halo series is officially debuting sometime in 2022 as revealed by Paramount+ yesterday.

An epic 26th-century conflict between humanity and an alien threat known as the Covenant. Halo will weave deeply drawn personal stories with action, adventure and a richly imagined vision of the future.

The series will include the iconic video game character Master Chief played by Pablo Schreiber. Filming had been taking place in Budapest, Hungry and Pablo has suggested on Instagram that they’re still making the show.

This isn’t a shocking development as we saw something similar happen when WarnerMedia moved Ridley Scott’s sci-fi series Raised By Wolves from TNT to HBO Max, that worked out well for Max as the company revealed Wolves became their most popular original content last year.

At one time, director Neill Blomkamp and producer Peter Jackson were developing Halo as a feature film for 20th Century Fox before the project was killed as Blomkamp and Jackson pivoting to make District 9 instead.

SOURCE: DEADLINE