Battleangel

As the clock ticks down toward the December start date of James Cameron’s next project, the director is shifting his full attention from “Battle Angel.” Although he has publicly identified that film as his next movie, he also is readying a parallel project, tentatively titled “Project 880,” according to sources at Cameron’s Lightstorm Entertainment.

Both films would be shot in 3-D with custom-designed high-definition cameras. Whichever film Cameron does next, he also plans to use a photo-real version of the performance capture technology used by Robert Zemeckis on “The Polar Express.”

Seven years after “Titanic” took the all-time global boxoffice crown ($1.8 billion), the 50-year-old writer-director had said that he plans to return to directing with a big-budget studio picture for 20th Century Fox after producing TV and movie projects (”Dark Angel,” “Solaris”) and experimenting with 3-D Imax documentaries.

Cameron had focused much of his attention on “Battle Angel,” based on Yukito Kishiro’s 12 popular Japanese graphic novels about a nymphette who morphs into an action heroine. Cameron has reworked a script from “Alexander” screenwriter Laeta Kalogridis that could serve as the beginning of a franchise.

While Lightstorm would not reveal a final title or story line for the new project it is calling “Project 880,” Cameron could decide to film that feature before tackling “Battle Angel,” which has proved to be a difficult script to adapt.

Source: Hollywood Reporter

Except for the Hollywood reporter not really grasping the story of Gunnm and making an embarrassing “nymphette action heroine” reference, this seems about right. There has been talk of a trilogy of Gunnm movies. And I can personally vouch for the intricacy of the Gunnm experience. Perhaps even too intricate for Hollywood to grasp, like Kishiro-san also hinted, it would be preferable if they could adapt the underlying philosophy and themes of Gunnm rather than do a number on the much more obvious story. Can’t help being a little anxious, especially since the author seems too modest to butt in and be an active part of the production. Gunnm fans ought to take this matter to Cameron and make sure he gets it right. Not to diminish Laeta Kalogridis, but after having written the script for “Alexander” and been a script consultant for “Catwoman” and “Tomb Raider” I don’t really have much confidence in her abilities.

See also:
[Yukito Kishiro interview by MNS (January 2005?)] [IMDB] [Wikipedia] [Battleangel.info]