-
"Hey, bring down the bone saw."
District 9 director Neill Blokamp is back with a new movie, and it's no surprise that it's a sci-fi flick full of social commentary. Starring Matt Damon and Jodie Foster, Elysium will be headed to theaters in late summer, and from the looks of this first trailer, it will be full of action, drama, and examples of human nature at its worst. Still, Elysium looks like a great place to live, and we totally want to get our hands on the Versace cancer-eliminating pod thing. It's the perfect statement piece for any living room.
watch the trailer >> Posted 04.11.13 by reelz -
After being able to operate mostly out of the public eye, more is finally being revealed from writer-director Neill Blomkamp's upcoming sci-fi movie Elysium, with the first official photo from the movie released in the print edition of Entertainment Weekly. Though it is Blomkamp's follow-up to his extraordinary 2009 feature debut, District 9, not much has been known about Elysium outside of the director's reveal that the movie would contain "sociopolitical ideas" inside a "Hollywood action film." That is, until a synopsis was leaked online last month. "Well, I suppose it was going to happen eventually," Blomkamp told EW, while confirming that the plot synopsis would indeed be about a futuristic society where the wealthiest citizens dwell in an enormous space station while everyone else lives on a inhospitable Earth.
"Even though it's set in the future there are a lot of things that are relevant to today," said Blomkamp. "When I'm generating ideas, they tend to be based on something real to begin with, like looking at an issue in a new way. Then I immediately start thinking about how we can get guns and explosions and slime in there." That is certainly true in the first photo, dutifully scanned by The Playlist, which depicts star Matt Damon as the bald Max holding a giant gun labeled "Chemrail" (no explanation on that) and revealing the mechanized arm apparatus initially revealed in set photos last year.
check out the full photo >> Posted 07.05.12 by Ryan -
It's been a while since we heard anything about writer-director Neill Blomkamp's new sci-fi movie, Elysium, the follow-up to his extraordinary 2009 feature debut, District 9. While set photos have revealed that the movie will star a bald Matt Damon, little has been revealed about the movie's plot outside of Blomkamp describing it as a sci-fi movie with "sociopolitical ideas" inside a "Hollywood action film." Casting notices also informed us that Jodie Foster was going to appear in the movie, but nothing was known about her role.
Thankfully, a synopsis for Elysium has finally been revealed via Collider. The site discovered a ticket for an advance preview that offered a detailed explanation of the movie, which indeed pays off on Blomkamp's promise of action interwoven into a deeper theme, not unlike what he accomplished with District 9.
read the synopsis >> Posted 06.15.12 by Ryan -
Writer-director Neill Blomkamp's new sci-fi movie, Elysium, went into production in Canada last month and now the first "spy" photos have leaked from the set, offering a first look at a very bald Matt Damon wearing some sort of exo-skeleton apparatus. Unfortunately, since virtually nothing has been revealed about the plot of the movie — all that is known is that it is set in the future and possibly on another planet, that it will be "violent, very violent", and that it will include the same sort of blend of action and sociopolitical themes as Blomkamp's hit 2009 feature debut, District 9 — there's no telling what is going on with Damon's character in these shots.
more about Elysium >> Posted 08.10.11 by BrentJS -
Simon Kinberg is best known as a screenwriter, having written the scripts for 2006's X-Men: The Last Stand and 2009's Sherlock Holmes, but Kinberg also works as a producer, with several projects in the works, including X-Men: First Class, the upcoming adaptation of Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, and secret, sci-fi movie Elysium.
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter was adapted by Seth Grahame-Smith from his novel and is currently being directed by Timur Bekmambetov. The story posits the former U.S. President as a master vampire slayer who lost his own mother to the undead. The story is an amusingly dark one, and Kinberg told io9 that the movie version will be a "dark and gory" one.
It's hacking people's heads off and killing vampires left and right. The main character has an axe, with which he kills countless amounts of vampires. It's a dark, cool, edgy, twisted movie. I don't know what the rating will be, but I suspect that the rating would be an R. I suspect it will be an R just because there's a lot of murder and decapitation.
more about the mysterious Elysium >> Posted 06.03.11 by Ryan -
Very little is known at this time about Elysium, writer-director Neill Blomkamp's highly-anticipated follow-up to his 2009 feature debut, District 9, a sci-fi movie with heavy sociopolitical connotations that proved both a critical success—an impressive four Academy Award nominations— and a box office smash. We know that it is a "violent, very violent and very unique" sci-fi movie set in the future and that it will contain a similar blend of action and sociopolitical themes as District 9, but nothing else about the plot has been revealed. In fact, if it wasn't for sporadic cast announcements, it would be difficult to even tell that Elysium is actually in pre-production right now.
The latest addition to the cast is Brazilian actress Alice Braga, who joins Sharlto Copley, Matt Damon, William Fichtner, two-time Academy Award-winner Jodie Foster and fellow Brazilian Wagner Moura. Braga's character was not revealed, but that's par for the course with this project. So far, it has only been revealed that Moura will play the villain and that Foster will play "a head of state on an alien planet." Elysium is slated to open March 8, 2013.
Posted 05.30.11 by BrentJS -
Sony Pictures is moving forward with Neill Blomkamp's Elysium, the director's super-secret follow-up to 2009's District 9. THR reports that the studio has set a release date of March 8, 2013, for the sci-fi project, which is set a hundred years into the future.
Blomkamp will reunite with his District 9 actor Sharlto Copley on the project, which added Jodie Foster and Matt Damon to the cast in January. Latino Review reports that the latest addition is Brazilian actor Wagner Moura (Elite Squad), who is set to play the movie's villain.
Plot details on Elysium have been kept secret, though Blomkamp has previously described the movie as having "sociopolitical ideas" and Damon is reportedly playing an ex-con. If the recently released viral video is any guide, Elysium may follow the effects a virus, or the video could be about another project entirely.
Blade Runner's Syd Mead has been hired to create the look of the futuristic world in Elysium, which will start shooting in Vancouver in July before moving to Mexico City.
Posted 03.10.11 by Ryan -
District 9 director Neill Blomkamp cut short his scheduled series of studio meetings on Wednesday after Sony Pictures snapped up the rights to his next movie, Elysium. The movie, written by Blomkamp, is being produced by Media Rights Capital and has Blomkamp's District 9 lead, Sharlto Copley, attached to star in it, along with Academy Award-winners Jodie Foster and Matt Damon.
The plot of Elysium is a secret at this time, but it will be set 100 years in the future and is expected to contain a social allegory in much the same way that District 9 used alien refugees to comment on apartheid in South Africa, possibly involving a geneticist named Joseph Kulper who creates a virus that kills anyone without an IQ of at least 70 (see video below). Acclaimed set designer Syd Mead (Blade Runner) has been hired to design the look of the future world and tech in the movie.
what did blomkamp say about Sony's acquisition? >> Posted 01.22.11 by BrentJS -
Director Neill Blomkamp's District 9 follow-up, Elysium, is starting to look less mysterious, at least in terms of the cast. Sharlto Copley was confirmed in December for the project, which Blomkamp has described as a sci-fi movie with "sociopolitical ideas" inside a "Hollywood action film."
Deadline reports Copley will be joined by Jodie Foster and Matt Damon in the movie. Like Copley, the roles Foster and Damon will play are unknown, as is the movie's plot. Blomkamp released a strange viral video in November titled AGM Heartland, though whether the video has any relation to Elysium is, again, unknown.
Elysium has no release date so far, since the movie is still being shopped to studios, but the growing cast should entice a studio and perhaps a release date will be announced shortly. Until then, Foster fans can enjoy her next directorial effort, The Beaver, which follows Mel Gibson as a depressed man who uses a puppet to reconnect to his friends and family on April 11.
Posted 01.04.11 by Ryan -
It's unclear just exactly what director Neill Blomkamp's next movie will be, but it seems likely that he plans on remaining in the sci-fi genre that he tackled so well in last year's surprise hit District 9. The movie was made on a shoestring budget — for a modern sci-fi movie with extensive special effects — and went on to earn more than $210 million at the worldwide box office. Blomkamp said back in January that his next project will be sci-fi, but with "sociopolitical ideas" inside a "Hollywood action film," but he didn't give any indication of what that might be.
Recently, a freaky, mysterious video credited to Blomkamp for something called AGM Heartland appeared in the iPad digital edition of Wired Magazine (issue number 18.12), but some speculate that the video is for a web series and not a feature. Now, Deadline has reported that Blomkamp is shopping around a sci-fi project called Elysium as his next feature and that his District 9 star, Sharlto Copley, is attached to headline it.
more about Blomkamp's Elysium >> Posted 12.10.10 by BrentJS