Kasdan writing Boba Fett? Spielberg and Bardem for Montezuma?

Dalton Trumbo was an accomplished screenwriter in the ’60s ’70s who worked on Spartacus and Papillon as well as picking up two Oscars and, due to patriotic controversies, landed eleven months in prison. In 1965, he wrote a draft script for a project called Montezuma, the true tale of an epic feud between invading Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortez and titular Aztec leader Montezuma, which was handed to Kirk Douglas but the development came to a stop. Now nearly 70 years on, the world’s most famous film director, who still  has street-cred thanks for still making personal movies and being part of the Palme D’Or judging panel, and a lead star seems to be in the bag already.

Javier Bardem is the Oscar winning star of No Country For Old Men, Skyfall and The Sea Inside who’s been scouted for the role of Cortez for Montezuma who’ll be joining Spielberg (director of Jurassic Park, Lincoln, War Horse, The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn, Munich, War of the Worlds, The Terminal, Catch Me if You Can, Minority Report, Artificial Intelligence, Saving Private Ryan, Amistad, Schindler’s List, Empire of the Sun, The Colour Purple, ET, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Jaws as well as sixteen time Oscar nominee) on Montezuma, which may be several rewrites from the greenlight but Spielberg needs to work on something soon after Robopocalypse and American Sniper respectively fell out of production.

We move on to a big story concerning the Star Wars universe. We all know that JJ Abrams will take over the franchise with Episodes VII (2015), VIII (2017) and IX (2019) and that a new instalment, likely spin offs or prequels/origin stories, will come in every year inbetween, and possibly after. Our favourite to be first up was Yoda, with other rumours stating Jabba or Han and Chewy or, sigh, Jar Jar Binks. However, Star Wars’ screenwriting legend Lawrence Kasdan is now rumoured to be writing a standalone adventure for bounty hunter supreme Boba Fett, although Jon Schnepp is convinced that this is true.

Schnepp, director of Metalocalypse, makes huge claims. “I know they haven’t announced it,” he told AMC, “I know. I know for a fact. I will never reveal my source, but it is the one written by Lawrence Kasdan.”

Star Wars Origins: Boba Fett/Star Wars Origins: Yoda – 2016?

Montezuma – 2016?

Star Wars spin-off films maybe origin stories

This Star Wars themed discussion isn’t as long as it should have been but a lot of today’s work was lost.

Disney’s chief financial officer, Jay Rasulo, has confirmed that Star Wars spin-off films, which we’ve anticipated since Disney $4 billion purchase of Lucasfilm, will be origin stories. This puts more fuel into Disney’s aim to release a Star Wars film every year starting in two years time. JJ Abrams will reboot the stalled franchise with Episode’s VII, VIII and IX in 2015, 17 and 19 respectively and it looks as if we’ll be getting the origin stories of other characters in the years in between. The current question now on everyone’s minds is which characters will be the subject of these origins.

“There’s incredible flexibility. It’s an unbelievable palette to create from,” Rasulo explains at a statement. “The overall strategy is to put out a great film first,” he says as he defends accusations that much of the new series’ existence is for money through merchandising.

Anyway, back to who could be the focus of these spin-offs. Yoda is the current favourite. There’s plenty of possible storylines to do with Yoda’s youth and whether he was ever tempted by The Dark Side but I don’t think he’s a credible enough character for his one standalone film. The other contenders are Boba Fett (in a story telling his transition from Dad lacking child at the fight pit to the world’s most feared bounty hunter) and Darth Maul. The only prequel I’d be interested in is a buddy comedy with Han Solo (a CG airbrushed Harrison Ford or Ryan Gosling) and Chewbacca (only make him motion capture if a practical effect really doesn’t look convincing). Another spin-off I would watch is Mace Windu. He’s presumed dead when Darth Sidious throws him out of the window of his 100 story up apartment but we never see him fall, or land, so he could have landed on one of the millions of cars that fill up the multi-levelled traffic on the city-planet of Coruscant.

Disney seem to have a year by year strategy. Their plan per year is one Star Wars, two Marvels (2013: Iron Man 3 and Thor: The Dark World, 2014: Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Guardians of the Galaxy, 2015: The Avengers: Age of Ultron, Ant-Man), one or two Pixar animations (e.g Inside Out, The Good Dinosaur, Finding Dory) as well as one of Disney’s own animations (like Tangled) and an annual big budget live-action (for example recent flops like John Carter and The Lone Ranger plus hits like Tron: Legacy and Pirates of the Caribbean).

Fox once tried to set up their own Origin franchise with the X-Men in 2009 but X-Men Origins: Wolverine is still regarded as the worst in the series so they returned to proper stories like First Class, The Wolverine (which are both prequels and spin-offs not origin stories) and Days of Future Past.

The fact is, spin offs are never great. Granted, The Wolverine and Puss in Boots are perfectly fine and The Scorpion King isn’t as bad as everyone makes it out to be but there’s been Elektra, Catwoman and Evan Almighty.

Disney do have faith in these origins stories however 4 time Oscar nominee and Empire Strikes, Return of the Jedi and Rasiders of the Lost Ark writer Lawrence Kasdan and X-Men: Days of Future Past, Mr. and Mrs. Smith and Sherlock Holmes scribe Simon Kinberg.

Star Wars: Episode VII is out Christmas 2015

Star Wars Origins: Yoda could be out Summer or Christmas 2016