Neill Blomkamp Would Like To Return To The World Of District 9
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In 2009, Neill Blomkamp’s directorial debut, District 9, surprised audiences across the country. The sci-fi movie was an original film from an unknown director, so the film’s final $210.8 million box office and Academy Award Best Picture nomination was truly shocking. Since the film was so successful, it seems inevitable that Blomkamp would consider making a sequel, possibly called District 10.
At an Elysium press event in Los Angeles, California, Neill Blomkamp recently expressed interest in returning to the world of District 9:
In terms of sequels to my own stuff, a lot of it just comes down to if there’s more to say. And I think the world of District 9 has a lot of very interesting race and oppression-based ideas that I would still like to explore in that world. Again, I have zero problems, I’ll make my own stuff or whatever you want to call it, sequelize [sic] my own stuff.
At the same press event, screenwriter Simon Kinberg, who produced Elysium, joined Blomkamp while Sony screened 10 minutes of footage of the new sci-fi film. When the conversation came to Blomkamp’s failed attempt to make a big-screen Halo movie — which eventually led to District 9 instead after Halo‘s financing fell apart — Blomkamp was asked if there were any other “pieces of cinema history” or “iconic characters” he would consider tackling in the future. The folks at /Film are interpreting his response — and a reported “smirk” from Kinberg — as a veiled reference to whether Blomkamp would ever consider helming a Star Wars movie. Here’s Blomkamp’s quote, so judge for yourself:
And then there’s a few pieces of cinema history that I like so much I don’t know whether I could be involved with them. There’s, you know, there’s iconic characters that I really like that I would love to get closer to and make a film about. When I start dipping my toes into it, I get this allergic reaction. Maybe one day I’ll end up doing something like that.
Disney hired Simon Kinberg to write screenplays for as-yet-unidentified Star Wars projects, so considering that he was also at the press event, one of those so-called “pieces of cinema history” certainly could be Star Wars. Or it might not. It’s total speculation at this point, even considering that Blomkamp is one of the people you’d expect to be on Disney’s short-list for future Star Wars projects. Either way, it sounds like he’s more interested in telling his own stories, and in Hollywood? That’s a thing both rare and wonderful.
