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3RD UPDATE: Sony Pictures Snaps Up Neill Blomkamp’s ‘Elysium’; Matt Damon And Jodie Foster Set To Star

By MIKE FLEMING JR | Wednesday January 19, 2011 @ 4:04pm PSTTags: Bill Block, Elysium, Jodie Foster, Matt Damon, Neill Blomkamp, Sharlto Copley, Simon Kinberg
Mike Fleming

3RD UPDATE: Sony Pictures has now decided to go it alone on Neill Blomkamp’s new scifi pic Elysium for worldwide distribution. So there is no Universal Pictures’ involvement, as the studio declined to take part. MRC put the deal together.

2ND UPDATE: Director Neill Blomkamp issued this statement: “I literally could not be happier.  I have a brilliant relationship with Sony. I loved them during District 9, they 100% get this film and they get me. Elysium is in very good hands.”

1ST UPDATE: EXCLUSIVE: Sony Pictures has won the right to distribute District 9 filmmaker Neill Blomkamp’s next project titled Elysium. The producers are currently in negotiation with Universal Pictures to co-finance the film. Meetings with several other studios were cancelled as this scenario took shape. Matt Damon and Jodie Foster are set already to star along with District 9 star Sharlto Copley. Sony clearly values the relationship it built with Blomkamp after his $30 million low-budget first film became a sleeper hit that was nominated for Best Picture and grossed $210 million worldwide. That, too, was a distribution deal.

At the same time, MRC has signed an overall deal with Blomkamp, and has given a green light to a second movie. Titled Chappie, the film will go into production immediately after Blomkamp completes Elysium, which is now scheduled for a late 2012 release. Like Elysium, Blomkamp wrote Chappie as an original, and that picture is not part of this distribution arrangement.

SPE’s Amy Pascal and Michael Lynton have shown a willingness to make big bets on project packages that fit their release schedule needs. That happened on such projects as Roland Emmerich’s 2012, and The Other Guys. SPE also made an MRC deal for 30 Minutes Or Less, directed by Ruben Fleischer and starring Jesse Eisenberg and Danny McBride.

PREVIOUS 1:30 PM: District 9 director Neill Blomkamp has been meeting with studios today on Elysium, his futuristic science fiction next film. The pic, which stars Matt Damon, Jodie Foster and Sharlto Copley, is being financed by Media Rights Capital. Blomkamp, MRC’s Modi Wiczyk and Simon Kinberg (who’s producing with Bill Block) began the day by going from studio to studio, meeting with high-level decision makers who are reading the script, followed by a  storyboarded presentation by Blomkamp. This is being repeated at every studio but Disney, which won’t make R-rated event films.

I’m told this the movie has the social allegory present in the Sony Pictures Entertainment-directed District 9, but it’s an unabashedly big movie, set 100 years in the future, with all of the obligatory gadgets and technological advances. Blomkamp will have his sets designed by Syd Mead, famous for his work on films like Blade Runner. Mead’s very hard to hire, but he responded because he so liked District 9. The film will prep in April, and start production in July in Vancouver before moving to Mexico City in the fall. The film will be delivered in time for release during the 2012 holidays. It’s a tent pole-sized proposition, but like Chris Nolan’s Inception, it’s a fully realized project that a studio can pencil into its release calendar. I don’t think it’s going to take long to sell.

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Jodie Foster Joins Neill Blomkamp’s ‘Elysium’

By MIKE FLEMING JR | Monday January 3, 2011 @ 11:35am PSTTags: Elysium, Elysium Distribution, Jodie Foster, Matt Damon Elysium, Media Rights Capital, Movies, Neill Blomkamp, Sharlto Copley
Mike Fleming

EXCLUSIVE: Though it hasn’t yet been shopped to studios by Media Rights Capital, Neill Blomkamp’s District 9 followup Elysium is looking better and better. He’s just gotten Jodie Foster to commit and join Matt Damon and District 9‘s … Read More »

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Matt Damon In Talks To Join Neill Blomkamp’s ‘Elysium’

By MIKE FLEMING JR | Friday December 10, 2010 @ 7:55am PSTTags: Elysium, Matt Damon, Matt Damon Elysium, Movies, Neill Blomkamp, Sharlto Copley
Mike Fleming

EXCLUSIVE: Matt Damon is in early negotiations to star in Neill Blomkamp’s scifi film Elysium for Media Rights Capital. Damon will join District 9‘s Sharlto Copley in a film that is shrouded in secrecy. While a Damon commitment–they’re in the … Read More »

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Neill Blomkamp Moving Ahead On ‘Elysium’

By NIKKI FINKE, Editor in Chief | Monday December 6, 2010 @ 9:10am PSTTags: Elysium, Elysium Distribution, Media Rights Capital, Movie Deals, Movies, Neill Blomkamp, Sharlto Copley



EXCLUSIVE I’ve just learned that Neill Blomkamp is reteaming with his District 9 star Sharlto Copley on his second sci-fi feature Elysium. Copley played Wikus van de Merwe in District 9 as well as HM Murdock in this summer’s The A-Team reboot. Meanwhile, director Blomkamp … Read More »

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A Post Comic-Con Wish List of 15 Films The Geek Crowd Really Wants To See

By MIKE FLEMING JR | Monday July 26, 2010 @ 8:21am PDTTags: Akira, At the Mountains of Madness, Bioshock, Brian K. Vaughan, Comic-Con, Comic-Con Convention, Gore Verbinski, Guillermo Del Toro, Isaac Asimov, Katsuhiro Otomo, Marc Forster, Mark Protosevich, Max Brooks, Neil Gaiman, Neill Blomkamp, Sam Raimi, Stephen King, The Dark Tower, World War Z
Mike Fleming

Studios brought stars and film clips to Comic-Con, seeking geek love for all of its superhero and fantasy projects. While they’re paying attention, how about some of the more ambitious films these die-hards have waited years to see? After … Read More »

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