Before James Cameron directed Titanic—a.k.a. the single biggest movie of all time—he churned out some of our all-time favorite sci-fi/action flicks, like the first two Terminator movies, Aliens, The Abyss, True Lies, etc. And now, after taking a 12 year break from writing and directing, he’s back with his new sci-fi epic Avatar, which features Sam Worthington from Terminator: Salvation, Zoe Saldana and the Blue Man Group. Seriously though, this is gonna be the winter blockbuster when it drops in December, so familiarize yourself with this debut footage. [via /film]
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District 9 got it for cheap!
Thirty million dollars is a lot of money in the real world, but in the action-packed, CGI-heavy science fiction film universe, it’s like a single food stamp. Provided this shoestring budget by producer Peter Jackson, first-time director Neill Blomkamp made District 9, his superb story of humans and aliens living together discordantly in South Africa, look like 200 million bucks. The film’s extraterrestrials, or “prawns,” as they’re derisively referred to by their oppressive human counterparts, are rendered entirely by high-quality CGI, which obviously costs. Blomkamp, whose movie comments upon the system of apartheid he grew up in (amongst other modern societal ills like corporate greed), saved money by filming in abandoned Johannesburg shanty towns. Rather than hire an expensive name actor, he cast his friend and colleague Sharlto Copley, who, despite no previous acting credits, is tremendous in the lead role of unassuming government agent Wikus Van De Merwe.
We’re rooting for District 9 to make back its budget many times over, because we’ve seen a lot of expensive crap recently (ahem, Transformers 2, ahem). In honor of District 9 and everything that Blomkamp has already accomplished, Complex gives you 12 other ill action-packed movies that didn’t break the bank to be money.
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