Those of you who have seen District 9 can attest that Sharlto Copley should be in a lot more movies. The South African actor delivered a fantastic performance in that film (his first time acting professionally), and since went on to star in The A-Team and the Neill Blomkamp’s upcoming film Elysium opposite Matt Damon. Now Variety reports that the actor has just been offered the villain role in Spike Lee’s American remake of Oldboy, a 2003 Korean thriller from director Chan-Wook Park that holds the distinction of being one of the most disturbing movies I’ve seen in a long time.

Lee has always been a controversial filmmaker, but I’m doubtful the same visceral qualities of the original Korean film will translate equally to American screens (especially the gut-punch of the ending). That being said, I’m glad this project isn’t in the hands of Steven Spielberg and Will Smith, as it once was. Josh Brolin and Elizabeth Olsen are set to star, with Brolin playing a man kidnapped and locked up for 15 years for no reason who is suddenly released and wants revenge on his captors. But first he must find out who they are, and Olsen plays a case worker trying to help him find the truth.

Copley will play a mysterious billionaire who wants to destroy Brolin’s life. Though he hasn’t played one on screen yet, I think Copley is a great choice for a villainous role. He’s an actor that really brings a lot of energy to whatever he does, and I’m interested to see how he comes across as a bad guy. Thoughts?

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Variety are reporting that character actor William Fichtner, last seen opposite Nicolas Cage in Drive Angry 3D, is in final talks to join the growing cast of District 9 director Neill Blomkamp’s follow up Elysium.

Fichtner is a perrenial ‘that guy from tv’ face probably best known for his roles on the small screen in Prison Break and Entourage, and small but memorable parts in big movies such as The Dark Knight, Armageddon and Black Hawk Down. He will be joining the already attached Jodie Foster, Matt Damon, Sharlto Copley and Wagner Moura.

The film was pitched to studios recently by Blomkamp and his backers Media Rights Capital with Sony snapping up distribution within hours, such is Blomkamp’s standing after his critically and commercially lauded debut. Blomkamp has described it as another sci-fi film but different to District 9. The story is said to be set 150 years in the future, will have some elements of social allegory as well as being very violent and very unique.

Blomkamp has also been lucky enough to secure the services of noted futurist/artist/production designer Syd Mead, probably most famous for his work on Blade Runner and a man very choosy about what he works on these days.

Elysium is set to go before cameras in late Spring in Vancouver for a March 8th 2013 release.

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Or should we say District 8? Sharlto Copley, who played protagonist Wikus van de Merwe in Neill Blomkamp’s 2009 masterpiece, spoke to Empire today regarding the sequel to District 9.

Copley says that the second District 9 will potentially begin development in 2 years, after Blomkamp’s second feature film:

“Neill wants it and I want it. Neill’s doing another film first. Then I think if everything goes according to plan we’ll do the second film in about two years time. That story can go in so many different ways. There’s a whole universe. I’m sure a lot of writers say that, but we actually have an entire universe.”

I’m glad that the guys have an “entire universe;” it’s exciting to know that District 9 has even more background and plotlines than we saw in the original film. Regarding the story of the sequel, Copley says:

“There’s a million ways you can go. Neil’s actually very interested in prequels as well; he’s said that a few times. We wouldn’t do the traditional Hollywood version of the sequel which would just be 100 aliens fighting humans.”

(Potential spoilers below! But it’s an article about a sequel, so if you were reading this without having seen the first one, then that’s a bit of a silly thing to do)

It’s been heavily suggested as far back as January that the next film will be a prequel, and with Copley’s comments here, it seems very likely that that’s the direction “District 10″ will take. I’d love to see everything that happened before the events of District 9; co-writer Terri Tatchell was quoted as saying that a big chunk of the original’s screenplay involving MNU trying to help the prawns inside the mothership was cut, due to budgetary constraints. However – ever since the end of D9, I’ve been waiting for Christopher Johnson to come back to Earth with an epic army and kick some serious ass. Copley outright says that’s not what they’d do, which is a shame… Regardless, I think I’d still rather see what happened after Wikus’s adventures rather than before. Maybe they’ll do a sequel as well, at some point? Who knows…

Interestingly, Copley also says that two shorts were filmed with the Wikus character before D9 was filmed.

“This thing started shooting in 2005, and before we shot the film we shot Alive In Joburg and two other shorts as part of Neil’s creative development process. Those next two films actually had my character, Wikus, in them, although I wasn’t called Wikus in them. So they were two parts of the development of the world and where the story was going to go and all that.”

It really does seem as if these guys have a “bigger picture” planned out, and whatever it is, I want to see more of it.

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HitFix quotes Terri Tatchell, co-writer of District 9 with director Neill Blomkamp, as stating that “never in a million years” did the pair plan for a sequel.

Apparently a large portion of District 9‘s initial screenplay was about Multinational United’s efforts inside the alien mothership, when it first landed above Johannesburg – these scenes were cut due to budget constraints, rather than the length of the screenplay.

By the end of District 9 (my 2009 film of the year), I thought a sequel had the potential to be awesome, even though the ending does still work well on its own (SPOILERS: seeing Christopher Johnson return to Earth with an alien army would be brilliant). Tatchell said she thought the finale was nice as a conclusion to the story. However, in addition to her comments yesterday, Blomkamp said back in January that he’d be much more interested in a prequel to the film, which would probably incorporate the cut sequences of the MNU in the mothership. /Film quotes him as saying:

If you go forward [with his story beyond District 9] it’s more of a traditional film but if you go backward I’d be intrigued in that. I’m not so interested in aliens coming back and blowing things up but [a prequel] might be interesting.

I’d rather a story that carries on from District 9, rather than precedes it, as I thought the original already did a fine job of summing up the events of the mothership’s landing. A prequel would still be very cool though, and I’ll just be happy to see whatever Blomkamp and Tatchell decide to do in the future.

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Today the nominations for the 82nd Academy Awards were announced, and as expected Avatar picked up quite a few in a number of categories. Sandra Bullock, Christoph Waltz, Jeremy Renner, Morgan Freeman, Carey Mulligan and Meryl Streep also recieved nominations for their acting.

You can see the full list of nominations below:

Best Picture
Avatar
The Blind Side
District 9
An Education
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Precious
A Serious Man
Up in the Air

Actor in a Leading Role
Jeff Bridges – Crazy Heart
George Clooney – Up in the Air
Colin Firth – A Single Man
Morgan Freeman – Invictus
Jeremy Renner – The Hurt Locker

Actor in a Supporting Role
Matt Damon – Invictus
Woody Harrelson – The Messenger
Christopher Plummer – The Last Station
Stanley Tucci – The Lovely Bones
Christoph Waltz – Inglourious Basterds

Actress in a Leading Role
Sandra Bullock – The Blind Side
Helen Mirren – The Last Station
Carey mulligan – An Education
Gabourey Sidibe – Precious
Meryl Streep – Julie & Julia

Actress in a Supporting Role
Penelope Cruz – Nine
Vera Farmiga – Up in the Air
Maggie Gyllenhaal – Crazy Heart
Anna Kendrick – Up in the Air
Mo’Nique – Precious

Animated Feature
Coraline
Fantastic Mr. Fox
The Princess and the Frog
The Secret of Kells
Up

Art Direction
Avatar
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
Nine
Sherlock Holmes
The Young Victoria

Cinematography
Avatar
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
The White Ribbon

Directing
Avatar
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Precious
Up in the Air

Music (Original Score)
Avatar
Fantastic Mr. Fox
The Hurt Locker
Sherlock Holmes
Up

Visual Effects
Avatar
District 9
Star Trek

Writing (Adapted Screenplay)
District 9
An Education
In The Loop
Precious
Up in the Air

Writing (Original Screenplay)
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
The Messenger
A Serious Man
Up

The winners will be revealed on March 7th in a ceremony presented by Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin.

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The Academy released a list of 15 films in contention for the 2010 Visual Effects Oscar last month, and now they’ve narrowed the list down to 7 films. Here they are:

Avatar
District 9
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Star Trek
Terminator Salvation
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
2012

Later this month members of the visual effects branch will watch excerpts from the movies, and the list will then be narrowed down to 3. Earlier this year it was a showdown between Iron Man, The Dark Knight and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, with Button’s ageing effects coming out on top.

If I were a betting man i’d put my money on Avatar. It’ll be interesting to see which 3 make it through to the next round.

Which film do you think should win the Visual Effects Oscar?

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Last year Neill Blomkamp proved quite a few things with District 9. He threw out the need for A-List actors by hiring unknown actor Sharlto Copley for the lead. He proved that you don’t need major studio backing to get a film made (although having Peter Jackson as producer helps), and he proved that you can make over $200 million from a great sci-fi film with a small budget (around $30 million).

With the success of District 9 Hollywood now have Blomkamp firmly on their radar, however the director recently spoke to Hero Complex and told them that he isn’t interested in directing a big budget movie. In fact he’s turned a few of them down.

“I’ve been offered films – a lot of films, in fact – with seriously high budgets, and I’ve turned them all down. The reason is exactly what you said earlier: Once the budgets get bigger, you can’t do what you want as a director, unless you’re Peter Jackson or James Cameron. And even then, the pressure is still on the filmmaker. Even if the studio isn’t clamping down on you, all the pressure is on the director. And if you screw that up, the jeopardy situation is even worse. The way you don’t get yourself in that jeopardy situation is by making films that aren’t as risky financially. I just want to make films that have enough of a budget to pull off high-level imagery but also have a budget that is low enough that I can do what I want.”

“This next movie will cost more than “District 9? but it will cost much, much less than the big summer films. You can do a lot for less now. It’s all about process, too. If go into it knowing what you want to accomplish, you can save money. If you go into it trying to figure out what you want, it’s going to cost a lot of money. The other aspect is trimming it down. It’s like a diet. Instead of 2,000 effects shots, you can probably do with 1,000. Those kinds of sacrifices are worth it if you get to make something that is not in any way generic.”

I like Blomkamp’s way of thinking. I suppose he could have easily agreed to make a big movie for the paycheck, however he’d must prefer to make a movie his way than have studio interference. A group called Media Rights Capital are financing his next sci-fi project and they are letting him do what he wants. He hasn’t revealed what it involves yet, however we do know that he’s up for a District 9 sequel, so we’ll have to keep an eye on him in the future.

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Twitter grew tremendously in 2009, mainly because it has become a people search engine. News, events, and movies become trending topics and you can see what people are saying about them in real-time. As we will soon be heading into 2010 Twitter has complied a list of the top trending topics (ie. most talked about) of 2009 for different categories, and below is the list of movies that took over the Twitter-sphere this year:

1. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
2. New Moon
3. District 9
4. Paranormal Activity
5. Star Trek
6. True Blood
7. Transformers 2
8. Watchmen
9. Slumdog Millionaire
10. G.I. Joe

I have no idea what True Blood is doing there. Harry Potter and New Moon were expected, however the movie that takes the #3 spot is interesting. I can remember around the time District 9 was released Twitter was full of positive buzz for the film, and that buzz most likely encouraged people to see it. I have no way of proving it but I’m pretty sure the Twitter buzz contributed to the film making over $200 million worldwide. Twitter probably contributed to the success of Paranormal Activity too.

What can we expect for next year? Well we have Eclipse and Deathly Hallows being released so they will probably hit the top spots again. I can imagine Iron Man 2 becoming a trending topic for a while, and maybe Kick-Ass will be the ‘District 9′ of 2010?

(You can follow Filmonic on Twitter here)

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The 82nd Academy Awards will be held next March and the 15 movies nominated for the Visual Effects Oscar have been revealed. Here they are:

Angels & Demons
Avatar
Coraline
Disney’s A Christmas Caro
District 9
G-Force
G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Sherlock Holmes
Star Trek
Terminator Salvation
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
2012
Watchmen
Where the Wild Things Are

In early January the list will be narrowed down to 7, then later in the month members of the visual effects branch will watch excerpts from the movies, and the list will be narrowed down to 3. Earlier this year it was a showdown between Iron Man, The Dark Knight and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, with Button’s ageing effects coming out on top.

Since Avatar Day when we got a glimpse at 15 minutes of footage I’ve had my money on Avatar winning, and from the early reviews it seems it will be a serious contender. I’m glad District 9 got a nod. Out of all the films nominated it had the lowest budget ($30 million) and the guys at WETA did a great job with those financial constraints.

Which visual effects wowed you in 2009? Who do you want to win the Visual Effects Oscar?

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Over the weekend District 9 made $37 million at the US box office and has earned another $7 overseas. As the film was made for only $30 million it’s safe to say it will make a nice profit, especially as it has yet to open in places such as the UK, France and Germany. Combine the numbers with positive reviews and the words ‘hit’, ‘success’ and ‘sequel’ start to pop up. Directer Neill Blomkamp spoke to Fangoria about the possibility of a sequel a few days before it’s release, and it looks like he’s up for one.

“I’d love to make a sequel, because it’s so creatively rewarding to me; there’s just something about [the story],” the South African-born Blomkamp told Fango of his debut feature, in which aliens have been living alongside humans for the past 28 years in Johannesburg—albeit confined to a shantytown slum. “It’s my background mixed with the science fiction that I loved. I’d really like to go back to the world of DISTRICT 9—which, without Sharlto’s character, would be a very different kind of movie. So I think automatically the two of us will be reunited again, should the public decide that this film is something they want to see and it’s successful.”

Producer Peter Jackson was also asked about a sequel (pre-release) and he says he’d only want to make a sequel for the right reasons:

“We’re superstitious,” Jackson, who produced the film, told MTV News at the time. “Sitting down and talking about sequels when you haven’t even released the movie is, I think, tempting fate. We’ll get the film released, see how it does.”

“I believe movies should come from the heart, and if there’s any sequel or continuation of ‘District 9,’ it should only be because there’s a good idea involved, not because it’s a money-making venture,” Jackson said.

I have to wait 2 more weeks to see District 9 in the UK so at the moment I can’t give my opinion on the sequel. From what I’ve read there are some people who think District 9 should be a standalone film, where as others think a sequel is inevitable and want to see one. If you have seen District 9, do you want a sequel?

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