There's an interesting Halo movie interview with Peter Jackson on the love it or hate it movie site, Ain't It Cool News. The interview focuses both on Peter's choice of Neill Blomkamp as the director and the importance of the script. Speaking on Blomkamp's nomination, Jackson admits that hiring a "new" director wasn't the plan, but that Blomkamp was simply the best choice."It's not deliberate and certainly for HALO it wasn't deliberate. I don't think even for a show like HALO, which is a big budget production, I don't think there's any problem whatsoever with a so-called first time director directing it. At the end of the day, Neill (Blomkamp) is not a first time director. He's a first time feature film director, but he understands film and grammar as good as anybody. He's done some wonderful short films and commercials. His visual eye is fantastic and his storytelling is great. The fact that it's a feature film just means that he gets to shoot for longer than he did in the short film. There really isn't anything else that's different."
Speaking of his personal involvement with the script (along with Lord of the Rings alumni Fran Walsh and Filippa Boyens), Jackson had some very encouraging words.
"The movie, as far as I'm concerned, as far as my involvement is concerned, is not going to go in front of the cameras until we have a really great script."
God, let's hope so. The interview is full of good stuff, and anyone interested in Halo should definitely check it out.
[Thanks, Doug Kriz]
