Repo Man Director Kickstarts Bill The Galactic Hero Adaptation
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In the nearly 30 years since Alex Cox broke into the film scene with cult classics like Repo Man, Sid and Nancy, and Straight to Hell, he has steered clear of the limelight, collapsing a career of well-received films in on itself by eventually writing and directing Repo Chick and Straight to Hell Returns, though thankfully a Sid and Nancy sequel has remained unmade.
During that mid-1980s heyday, Cox acquired the rights from famed sci-fi author Harry Harrison to adapt his 1965 novel Bill, the Galactic Hero, but never acquired the proper funding to make it. Cox recently took to the project-resurrecting powerhouse that is Kickstarter in an attempt to raise the $100,000 he feels is needed to deliver a quality film, which will be adapted from the screenplay Cox and Harrison were working on at the time of Harrison’s death in 2012.
To keep the costs low, Cox is promoting the use of film students at the University of Colorado where he teaches production and screenwriting, as well as shooting the film solely within the campus location. The money will mostly go to costumes and film equipment. Check out the following video and get your astronaut-themed wallet ready to open.
Harrison’s novel was a satirical take on Robert Heinlein’s Starship Troopers, replacing the hero’s instant rise to military success during an interstellar war against aliens with the drudgery of behind-the-scenes military life, telling the tale of Bill, a fuse-changer in a starship’s fusebay who finds fame as both a hero and a deserter during his journey.
Cox’s goal is to finish principal photography for the film by December 2013, with a lengthy post-production schedule to follow, given the small but necessary amounts of CGI and green-screen scenes he hopes to include. Following that, the music and sound design are to be performed by Academy Award winner Richard Beggs (Apocalypse Now) and film composer Dan Wool, and Cox hopes for a December 2014 release. I can’t imagine any other projects currently being tossed around that have been in development for almost 30 years, Episode VII notwithstanding. What does Guantanamo Bay look like in space?
