Thursday, March 3, 2011

Updated: What The Flip! Blade Runner Sequel in Development?

Warners Brothers are planning a sequel (or prequel or tv series) to Ridley Scott's Sci Fi classic 'Blade Runner?'

Alcon Entertainment has set plans to develop a franchise based on the original 1982 film and are in final negotiations to secure the rights for development as sequels, prequels, a television series, or all of the above thankfully the rights would not allow them to remake or reboot the original. The studio press release explains:
Warner Bros-based financing and production company Alcon Entertainment (“The Blind Side,” “The Book of Eli”) co-founders and co-Chief Executive Officers Broderick Johnson and Andrew Kosove, in the most significant property acquisition negotiations in the Company’s 13-year history, are in final discussions to secure film, television and ancillary franchise rights to produce prequels and sequels to the iconic 1982 science-fiction thriller “Blade Runner.”

Alcon is negotiating to secure the rights from producer-director Bud Yorkin, who will serve as producer on “Blade Runner” along with Kosove and Johnson. Cynthia Sikes Yorkin will co-produce. Frank Giustra and Tim Gamble, CEO’s of Thunderbird Films, will serve as executive producers.

Alcon’s franchise rights would be all-inclusive, but exclude rights to remake the original. The Company, however, may produce projects based on situations introduced in the original film. The project would be distributed domestically by Warner Bros. International rights are yet to be determined.

Johnson and Kosove stated: “We are honored and excited to be in business with Bud Yorkin. This is a major acquisition for our company, and a personal favorite film for both of us. We recognize the responsibility we have to do justice to the memory of the original with any prequel or sequel we produce. We have long-term goals for the franchise, and are exploring multi-platform concepts, not just limiting ourselves to one medium only.”
Update:Producer Andrew A. Kosove talked about his choice of director to handle the next Blade Runner movie, top of his list is Christopher Nolan:
"Our friend Christopher Nolan who we did Insomnia [with] would be the pie in the sky for us. To be clear I think what Christopher Nolan did - and to be clear, we cannot remake Blade Runner. As a legal matter, we have not bought the remake rights we have no interest in remaking it we can only do prequels or sequels. But I think the methodology that Christopher Nolan brought to Batman is precisely what we aspire to whomever the filmmaker is, whether Ridley Scott comes back and joins us or it's someone else. It's precisely what we aspire to with Blade Runner, that's the template for us."
Also he talked about Ridley Scott blessing for the project:
"The answer to that question is as follows. I'm going to answer it very briefly - we won't say if we've reached out to Ridley Scott or not, but what we will say is that Ridley Scott's blessing to what we're doing is very important to Alcon. It's important to Bud Yorkin, and certainly we have the greatest degree of respect to him as a filmmaker. He's one of the greatest living directors and one of the greatest directors of all time. So of course he's very important."