Neill Blomkamp / Instagram
A little over a month ago Chappie director Neill Blomkamp raised some eyebrows when he unveiled some concept art for an Alien film he had been working on. Initially it looked like these images came out of wishful thinking on the director’s part, but now that doesn’t seem to be the case. The South African filmmaker is currently promoting Chappie and, naturally, he’s been asked a lot of questions regarding a potential Alien film.
Apparently Blomkamp has been interested in taking a stab at the franchise for years now. Thanks to a little downtime during post-production on Chappie, he worked on some concept art for the potential project, which featured a disfigured Hicks, a nasty mother Alien, and, of course, Ripley. According to Blomkamp, the handful of images he shared doesn’t even begin to convey the movie he envisions.
Speaking with Uproxx, the director discussed the genesis of the project. “Speaking to Sigourney Weaver, when we were doing Chappie, she set off a bunch of thoughts in my head – I had come up with an idea that didn’t have Sigourney, it was a different idea,” Blomkamp says. “But I spent all of the shooting time with her, it was like, holy shit, that could actually be really interesting. When I came back to Vancouver, I had an entire year to work on Chappie. And when I wasn’t needed in the edit, I could think about Alien. So, I basically developed an entire movie and I did all of this artwork as well.”
That’s all well and good, but the question is: what’s Fox’s take on all this? They’ve been actively developing a sequel to Prometheus — and they wanted that film to distance itself from the franchise – so are they already considering rebooting the series with a hardcore Alien picture? According to Blomkamp, they’re very interested. “I’m the problem,” the director responds, when asked if the film could actually come to fruition. “Fox, they would make it. Like, tomorrow. They would make it.”
Ridley Scott can’t possibly be excited to hear this news, but who knows? He did back out of making the Blade Runner sequel. Maybe Scott quitting Prometheus 2 isn’t an impossibility. The director behind Exodus: Gods and Kings and G.I. Jane does have a bunch on his plate – and he’s currently hard at work at adapting The Martian — so maybe directing a sequel to Prometheus isn’t a major priority for him.
Honestly, though, neither a Prometheus sequel from Scott or an Alien film from Blomkamp are all that enticing. The young filmmaker so far has been telling his own stories, while Prometheus wasn’t exactly Scott’s finest moment behind the camera. Then again, those images Blomkamp worked on are awfully cool. Maybe he could make an Alien movie his own film, but if Chappie isn’t a hit, perhaps not. Plus, if his latest is a huge success, wouldn’t it be more likely he’ll use his clout to make another original movie?
Whatever the case, as long as Chappie is an improvement over Elysium, we should all look forward to whatever Blomkamp makes next.
Related Topics: Aliens
