Halo movie denied, Hollywood pulls out

by Richard Mitchell { Oct 20th 2006 at 10:30AM }

Variety, paragon of gaming news, is reporting that Fox Studios and Universal have pulled funding for the Halo movie. Hearing the nightmare chorus of fanboys screaming, "Why God? Why!?" into the heavens, I can only give you one answer. Money. Amid rumors that the film's budget would reach $200 million -- originally projected at $135 million -- the studios demanded at the last minute that the filmmakers reduce their deals. This demand was also made in light of the fact that Microsoft had already been promised $5 million up front and 10% of the gross.

This turn of events has led some to speculate that Halo's director -- newcomer Neill Blomkamp -- is too inexperienced. This was, however, dismissed by Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh's representative, Ken Kamins,

"Everybody is supremely confident in Neal [sic]. Part of what excited Peter and Fran was Neal's [sic] vision. We're very confident this film will move forward with the creative partners intact, who will take the film to production."

We're a little concerned that Variety managed to misspell both Neill's name and Bungie Studios' name (they spelled it Bungee), but hey, that's Hollywood for you. So, with Halo's fate hanging in the balance, how do you feel? Did you even care about it the first place?

[Via Joystiq]

Tags: bungie, bungie studios, BungieStudios, halo, Neill-Blomkamp, Peter-Jackson

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

monal @ Oct 20th 2006 10:38AM

this movie isnt dead by any means, they will get financing secured by another studio as long as Peter Jackson is attached to the project....

NEO1X @ Oct 20th 2006 10:56AM

I really wanted to see Master Chief played by Chuck Norris oh well I can still dream

Crash @ Oct 20th 2006 11:03AM

Let New Line Cinema step in... they should back up any movie which involves Peter J given the fact that they made millions on The Lord of the Rings trilogy, which by the way, no studio believed in in the first place.

IceBurgh @ Oct 20th 2006 11:33AM

Probably best if it does die. Video games based on movies are always a disappointment. Why blow $200M to create an expensive movie that critics will hate and fanboys will complain about for years to come. No one would have been satisfied with this movie. Why make it?

JCP @ Oct 20th 2006 11:38AM

I think this is good in a way, because halo is getting much to big for its own good, it is becoming a black hole of greed that is looking to suck all the cash from our pockets, if we let one video game become so much more than just a game then they all will, gaming to me is a culture, a community but I really think it should just stick to gaming or next thing you know everything from your barber to your food will be made by or partnered with microsoft

Keith Hodo @ Oct 20th 2006 1:01PM

Interesting commment out of my fiance's mouth this morning (she's a non-gamer in every sense of the word).

"Wow, I love watching you play Splinter Cell."

I'm thinking... yeah, right...

Then she says "Why don't they make a Splinter Cell movie?"

And I'm left thinking, yeah, why don't they do that?

A SC movie would be soooo awesome.

Richard Mitchell @ Oct 20th 2006 1:08PM

"Why don't they make a Splinter Cell movie?"

As I recall, a Splinter Cell movie has been "in the works" for some time now. The IMDB page says it's still in pre-production. Tom Clancy is credited as a writer.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0439829/

Wes @ Oct 20th 2006 3:45PM

It's probably better they don't make the movie.
Why? The only game to movie transistions that were any good was resident evil 1& 2, FF7 Advent Children ( that's all I can think of right off the bat). Bad ones? Mario ( sadly), Doom, Bloodrayne, X-men 3 ( game and movie sucked). There's probably more but I don't wanna think about it. If they make a movie, hopefully they won't combine Halo 1 & 2 and if they make a sequel I hope they don't do like bungie did and screw up by trying to hard. Personally, the only thing that made Halo 2 great was the multiplayer. And I'm not even talking about on Live.

puh_fifer @ Oct 20th 2006 7:32PM

The movie should have been based on the excellent novels "Fall of Reach" or "First Strike" by Nylund. The whole Alex Garland script thing was a waste in my opinion.