Halo film director speaks

By Tom Bramwell Published 11 August, 2006

On the Chief, Covenant, more.

Newly announced Halo film director Neill Blomkamp has spoken out about how he's approaching the film's coveted source material, and about his views on Halo in general.

Speaking to film website Ain't It Cool News, Blomkamp said - naturally - that he was a massive fan of both Halo titles, but that he prefers Halo 1 from "a conceptual and story perspective".

It also sounds like the Chief will be a mixture of a man-in-a-suit and computer-generated visuals. "The film has to have a feeling of reality, and so that means that I want to keep him real as much as I can," he said, but there's going to be a need for some CG.

He also explained that while he wants to be as faithful as possible to the source material, he obviously wants to film to stand on its own - and in some senses it's impossible to maintain complete loyalty to the pixels and polygons.

"Master Chief is certainly something that I do not want to change too much at all, there are certain things inside the Halo universe that are sacred and he's the main one," he said of the game's hero.

"Having said that, there is a need to revise certain parts of him, just from a purely technical standpoint, he has to actually be able to move, like a human, and the game design right now does not allow for full motion freedom, which we will have to achieve."

The same applies to the Covenant, he said - "the most important thing is that viewer thinks they are looking at something that lives and breathes".

"From an organic standpoint they have to be believable, they also need to be terrifying, and alien, and the best way to start doing that is to break that human silhouette, although many of them are bipedal anatomically, you can still shift the overall body to be something very alien."

Blomkamp's also a huge fan of the Flood, he says, and he's been very impressed so far with Peter Jackson's input as executive producer and the work Weta has done on preparing Halo for the big screen.

For more of his views on the film, which is due out in summer 2008, check out the full interview.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (47) Latest comment 6 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • rhinoxious #1 6 years ago

    sounds good, at least he prefers Halo 1 to Halo 2 when it comes to narrative structure.

  • AHiFi #2 6 years ago

    I'm sure his comments will reassure some people; but this is what the guys behind 'Doom' said...and I actually quite liked 'Doom'. =]

  • Rambaldi #3 6 years ago

    I just hope they don't try to fudge Halo 1 and 2 together into one movie...here's hoping they see sense and go for a trilogy!

    'Lord of the Plasma: Fellowship of the Sticky Blue Stuff'
    Edited by 1 at 11/08/06 @ 12:32

  • ManicDrunkMonk #4 6 years ago

    Graham Norton for the Chief!!!

    Now that would be a suprise eh?

  • Steroyd #5 6 years ago

    hmmm... sounds like MC could shed his armour to be more organic.

    I've said it before MC loses armour it WILL instantly suck.

  • penhalion #6 6 years ago

    As long as Guilty Spark is still in there I'll be watching. Is roddy McDowal (however you spell it..you know the guy from planet of the apes) does the voice then I'm sold...er is he still alive?

    For some reason he seems perfect as the totally litteral, slightly derranged (who wouldn't be after millions of years alone) Guilt spark.

  • el_pollo_diablo #7 6 years ago

    It'll be rubbish.

  • lambtron #8 6 years ago

    Hmm I appreciate much of the movie going public have nothing even approaching an imagination (hence complaints like - people fly in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon therefore it sucks). Nevertheless is there really a need to make teh covenant more alien? I mean if I saw one of them I am pretty sure I wouldnt mistake them for a guy...

  • Yossarian #9 6 years ago

    dude says all the right things in the interview

  • coojam #10 6 years ago

    Except the Covenant being terrifying. They're never portrayed as being terrifying in the game, simply an intelligent alien force. They're ugly, sure, but not terrifying.

  • chupachups #11 6 years ago

    "I've said it before MC loses armour it WILL instantly suck."

    That'll have to happen if they get a big-name star, they don't want to spend a movie hidden behind their costume.

  • Yossarian #12 6 years ago

    Elites are meant to be so fucking huge that men run in terror from them. he can make them dignified, intelligent, yadda yadda but they need to be scary/badass too.

    by all means make the Flood slavering zombies in space, though. that's what everyone wants to see.

    hopefully the leaked script is correct and it chronicles the fall of Reach

  • Yossarian #13 6 years ago

    and I have no problem with MC being revealed as long as he is played by a strong actor who makes him more than a cardboard cut-out action hero

  • Lukus #14 6 years ago

    If this movie manages to make me go wow in the same way the game did as I first stepped onto the ringed planet then I'm sure it will be pretty damn special. I think they will struggle to achieve this though. But with Jackson and Weta on board there's hope it will at least look amazing. Whether they can cobble together an engaging and exciting story with likeable characters and casting is a different matter.

  • PlugMonkey #15 6 years ago

    hmmm... sounds like MC could shed his armour to be more organic.

    I've said it before MC loses armour it WILL instantly suck.

    Agreed, but it's a bit of a double edged sword. I don't think it's as much down to whether a big-name star is involved as the fact that none Halo fans are going to have a hard time relating to a character who's basically a big, faceless robot. But then as soon as you take his helmet off (a la Judge Dredd) you completely destroy the character for the fans.

  • absolutezero #16 6 years ago

    >>and I have no problem with MC being revealed as long as he is played by a strong actor who makes him more than a cardboard cut-out action hero


    Thats what MC is though, he has no more depth that a Steven Seagull character.

    >>That'll have to happen if they get a big-name star, they don't want to spend a movie hidden behind their costume.

    Hugo Weaving spent the entire length of V behind a mask. With the draw of Petey J it could happen.

  • manic_mouse #17 6 years ago

    If you want to see what the guy can do have a look at "Alive in Joberg" here: http://www.spyf ilms.com/whatsNew.html

  • kangarootoo #18 6 years ago

    @disc

    MC talks all the time in the game cutscenes. As often as any of the other game characters.

    And as far as not seeing his face, the face of the character is his helmet. Just like the face of batman is his mask, not Bruce Wayne. Just like the face of Judge Dredd is his helmet, not his haircut.

    The fact that we never get to see MC's nose is not that relevant when establishing character.

  • Freek #19 6 years ago

    You diden't see Darth Vaders face for most the three movies, the only time you did see it is when he stopped being Darth Vader.
    Same aplies to the Chief. Some characters are thier costume.

  • The12thMonkey #20 6 years ago

    The bit about changes to the MC... well, when you play the game, you rarely see the Chief. You see through his eyes, his visor. Only when riding a vehicle or in a cutscene do you see his physical form. There desperately has to be some advancement of his character before he makes his way onto the screen, simply because for a lot of the time, we will be seeing him from the third person.

  • Yossarian #21 6 years ago

    plus it's worth pointing out the Chief is, like Gordon Freeman, mainly a blank canvas for the player to project themselves onto, with the exception of a few dry one-liners

    and so one of the main challenges for this film is to make him something more
    Edited by 1 at 11/08/06 @ 14:08

  • w00t #22 6 years ago

    Should be good.

    Stick a big guy in the suit and get someone to voice-over his lines.
    Bungie have their 'Halo bible', and they are very insistent about the film tying into established facts within the games and not making stuff up for the sake of it.
    As for the Covenant, I don't really know what he's on about distinguishing the alieness. Grunts are short and wear methane-breathing equipment, Jackals have bird-faces, Elites are 8ft tall with backwards knees and 4-ply mouths and Hunters are huuuuuge.

  • tenma #23 6 years ago

    Who says they have to get a big star to play master chief? All they need is someone with a good voice a la Hugo Weaving in V for Vendetta or James Earl Jones as the original Darth Vader, neither of which were considered "huge stars" but still managed to voice their respective characters wonderfully.

  • Santino #24 6 years ago

    i'll be very surprised if a cash-in film based on the most generic of characters and plot gets anything above very average reviews, and that is after accounting for it being a sci-fi action film. game-film adaptions are usually even worse than games based on films, even so there are games with far more interesting stories that have a chance of being converted to the big screen with some credibility, half life for example.

  • Rash' #25 6 years ago

    I question the relevence of this venture when it looks increasingly likely that the movie won't have a game tie in. If the third and final chapter in the trilogy of games is out next year and the film not until the following, what benefit will releasing a film about a franchise, which is currently destined to end as a trilogy, have on Microsofts business model? The most, it is currently destined to achieve is reach out to a new audience about a series gone by. The least? Appease fans of the series with a bad adaptation, which does little to broaden Microsoft's gaming demographic.

    Of course, the flip side is that this is Microsoft bid to enter the movie business... Then I'd have to say they out of they're league (if the plot for Halo 2 is any indication).

  • Santino #26 6 years ago

    "But what about the Halo books, A lot of people seem to respect them, And it certainly adds a lot of flesh to the halo universe. I can't think of many (any) games that have such a back story written on them like Halo."

    Maybe not, but then many games do their storytelling in the game rather than have books to flesh it out. either way it can be as fleshed out a world as possible it doesn't stop it being the generic sci-fi story and there are far more interesting story's and characters out there. i don't think anybody should expect any kind of developed story and just be happy if the film ends up like a poor mans starship troopers.
    Edited by 1 at 11/08/06 @ 17:05

  • BraveArse #27 6 years ago

    Nathan Fillion would be my choice. Not exactly a big name, but a damn fine actor - he was brilliant in FireFly imo - and a halo player to boot. He also has appeared in quite a few games (jade empire) most recently.
    Edited by 2 at 11/08/06 @ 17:12

  • Steroyd #28 6 years ago

    Who says they have to get a big star to play master chief? All they need is someone with a good voice a la Hugo Weaving in V for Vendetta or James Earl Jones as the original Darth Vader, neither of which were considered "huge stars" but still managed to voice their respective characters wonderfully.

    They don't even need an actor in the suit.

    Did you know that the 6ft giant inside Darth Vader was not the voice?

    Yeah the guy that did the voice of Mufassa in the Lion King was the muffled voice of Darth Vader, because Darth Vader had no Visible lips on the suit they were able to do a voice over which is achievable with MC.... unless they take off his suit (which is big no-no).

    The problem with Games - Movie conversions is that it's a noob fest, they tend to delve deep into the main characters past or personality or how they are what they are and try to cram it into a 90 minute movie for people who don't play the game, leaving the action to a bare minimum to what it could have been (examples. Hulk, Spiderman 1, X-men 1, DareDevil etc) it'll only take until a Halo 2 movie (if it survives the first one), that it'll be a proper Halo movie ala what the people who play the game want because the back story would have been accustomed to everyone in the first one.

    That's why i admire Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children it says "if you havn't played the game tough s**t" leaving newbies puzzled and hardcore happy. :-D

    /rant about Movie - Games off.

  • PlugMonkey #29 6 years ago

    You diden't see Darth Vaders face for most the three movies, the only time you did see it is when he stopped being Darth Vader.
    Same aplies to the Chief. Some characters are thier costume.

    Different rules for heroes and villains. The audience has to be able to relate to a hero, or he's not really a hero, he's a bloke who no-one cares about running around.

    Villains are different. You don't have to relate to them in the same way, so it's not such a big deal if you don't see their face or, indeed, any part of them at all. The less you know about them, the more sinister they are.

  • newt #30 6 years ago

    'Alive In Joberg' convinced me this guy can be to Halo what Nolan was to Batman. And that in my book, is a very good thing.

  • manic_mouse #31 6 years ago

    "it doesn't stop it being the generic sci-fi story and there are far more interesting story's and characters out there"

    The Halo universe is probably the most "fleshed out" and "interesting" of any videogame. Half Life may have the universe but not the cohesion or strong narrative that the Halo universe has, things required to make a good movie.

    Anyone who can call the Covenant "generic" aliens simply hasn't been paying attention. Heck, what other sci-fi has an alien civil war in it?

    "'Alive In Joberg' convinced me this guy can be to Halo what Nolan was to Batman. And that in my book, is a very good thing."

    I too was dubious until I saw "Alive In Joberg". That coupled with the interview he did have me quietly confident that this may the a Sci-Fi opera we've all been waiting for. Personally I hope it's 3 hours long...
    Edited by 1 at 11/08/06 @ 18:26

  • Yossarian #32 6 years ago

    there is a surprising amount of depth in the Halo universe, although Bungie have always been at pains to keep the plot fast-paced and accessible

    but with a little reading/close attention, it's there

    and it's by no means the most clichéd of sci-fi stories. it's got interesting things to say (particularaly about religious fundamentalism/dogmatism) as far as videogames generally go

  • tenma #33 6 years ago

    Did you know that the 6ft giant inside Darth Vader was not the voice?

    If I wanted to be a dick I'd say "Old!" :p

    But yeah, I knew james earl jones wasn't physically in the suit.

  • Hughes. #34 6 years ago

    "there are certain things inside the Halo universe that are sacred and he's the main one"

    I may get flamed for saying this, but Master Chief is a pretty generic gruff-voiced game cipher, neither game has much that would pass for character developement (I haven't read the books, so maybe there's more scope there) I don't see why he'd be thought sacrosanct. It's not like he's had the decades of developement of someone like old stoney face Judge Dredd to anger fans by betraying.

    Stick guy in suit. Make him gruff. Have him kill Covenant and Flood. Some story stuff on a groovy hoop-world. What's to offend, really?

    *Penhalion*, Roddy McDowell died some years ago I'm afraid.

  • Harmonica #35 6 years ago

    The fact that he thinks Halo 1 is better narratively than Halo 2 does not bode well. The storytelling in 2 is superlative, the first is by-the-book.

  • MasterThief #36 6 years ago

    THIS FILM WILL ROCK THE HOUSE!!! BEST GAME TO FILM ADAPTATION EVER I'M BETTING ON!!!

  • Metalfish #37 6 years ago

    If they've got any sense, they'll use the same voice actor for the chief as the games, surely?

  • chupachups #38 6 years ago

    "Who says they have to get a big star to play master chief? All they need is someone with a good voice a la Hugo Weaving in V for Vendetta or James Earl Jones as the original Darth Vader, neither of which were considered "huge stars" but still managed to voice their respective characters wonderfully."

    True, but then Star Wars was never expected to do as well as it did and only opened in a tiny number of cinemas. Oh yeah, and it did have Alec Guinness who was a fairly big name although admittedly not someone people would think of as an action star.


    "If they've got any sense, they'll use the same voice actor for the chief as the games, surely?"

    It all depends on the people with the money, what they say goes, they can overrule anyone because the project collapses without them. They'll only invest if they think there's a good chance of getting their money back with profit on top, and one of the surest ways to do that would be a big name star (heaven forbid but they might use Tom Cruise or someone like that).

    If they didn't use a big name star for MC, they'd probably want to shift the focus away from MC onto whoever the star does play, which may or may not be a good thing from a narrative point of view.

  • tenma #39 6 years ago

    If they didn't use a big name star for MC, they'd probably want to shift the focus away from MC onto whoever the star does play, which may or may not be a good thing from a narrative point of view.

    For advertising they really don't NEED a mega celebrity to headline the film. All they need to say is "Peter Jackon's Halo" in the commercial. They probably will get a big name celebrity to play Cortana, though just to pull in even more of the male libido.

  • MasterThief #40 6 years ago

    No! Cortana should be CG. Hell, she's 'CG' in the game. Why should she be anything other in the film?

    As for big names, I don't mind if Keyes and Johnson, etc are assigned big-name actors, such as Ed Harris and Denzel Washington respectively. But who plays the Chief is just as unimportant as who played Darth Vader. Just get a tall, athletic guy in a suit, and let Steve Downes do voiceover. Done.

  • newt #41 6 years ago

    and it's by no means the most clichéd of sci-fi stories. it's got interesting things to say (particularaly about religious fundamentalism/dogmatism)

    Exactly. And that's where this Blomkamp guy fits per-fect-ly. One look at his background and you know this project has a potential that goes beyond the big budget action flick.
    Edited by 1 at 12/08/06 @ 16:15

  • PAUL_CERULA #42 6 years ago

    It just better not reek of the movie doom or alien vs. predator. Doom was horrible because it had no imagination or complex battle scenes. Just a handful of army guys walking through corridors and shooting stuff.....BORING, show us something new.

    You can't have MC acting like a mutant ninja turtle either, like doing correographed fights and stuff. It's got to be bad### and gritty. And most importantly it doesn't have to be gory just REAL. Show as much imagination of the halo universe you can like everything from the massive snow battles in halo 1 to the covenant drop ship docks. He can pull it off if he stays true to the imagination.

  • Lex_Luthor #43 6 years ago

    "I can't think of many (any) games that have such a back story written on them like Halo."

    Well, unless you count Street Fighter 2, Devil May Cry, Doom, Tomb Raider and Resident Evil obviously.

    It's a video game movie, so chances are it's going to suck. Simple as.
    Edited by 1 at 13/08/06 @ 01:53

  • Darth_Flibble #44 6 years ago

    It can't be worse than Uwe Boll's films

    Alone in dark is one of the worst game to films ever

  • MasterThief #45 6 years ago

    @ Lex_Luthor

    Clearly your tribalistic gaming fanboy allegiances stretch as far as the film world.

    Tell me. When last did a game-to-movie adaptation have such a formidable group of backers, that included the likes of Microsoft, Fox, Universal, Alex Garland, Peter Jackson, Wingnut and WETA?

    When you can give me a credible answer, I'll start taking your inane dribble seriously.

  • Lex_Luthor #46 6 years ago

    Bit rich to see you calling others 'fanboy' al, innit :)

    Tell me why having a lot of fancy names attached to it automatically makes it a good film? Superman Returns had a ton of big names(Who claimed to be 'big fans' of the source material, natch) behind it as well, and it turned out a bit rubbish didn't it? The fact that this is a videogame movie merely means it's a bit more likely to be rubbish, big name support or no.

    But hey, no doubt you're right and this'll clean up at the Oscars when it comes out :)
    Edited by 1 at 13/08/06 @ 22:42

  • MasterThief #47 6 years ago

    When did I say that having loads of big names attatched will lead to Halo being any good? All I implied is that comparisons to the Mario film, Street Fighter, Resident Evil, Doom, Dead or Alive, Final Fantasy, etc are all null and void. By lieu of the resources that Halo is being supplied, it is in another league entirely to all of them.

    PS. It's already been asserted that albundy I'm not.

  • Bumsex Superking #48 6 years ago

    So it's being made by the guy who had millions at his disposal to make a Citroen ad, and the best he could come up with was a rip-off of a fan-made cgi video that had done the rounds on the internet for years of Soundwave body-popping to a remix of the Transformers theme? And when the sequel to the ad had to be made they made EXACTLY THE SAME THING AGAIN? Yeah, that's a great reccomendation, that is - a hack who doesn't have any original ideas of his own making a movie whose setting is already ripped-off from Larry Niven's Ringworld stories and pastes some sub-Aliens plot onto the top of it. This movie will suck balls badly, and will be made not with the moviegoer in mind, but the burburry-draped cunts who plant themselves in front of the screen and talk through the film for an hour and a half, preventing the rest of us from hearing it - in short, for the kind of drooling morons who do the rounds on the internet defending the Xbox like their lives depended on it, even though it's nothing more than a plastic fucking box that can't remember what time of day it is.
    AND THEN we can all listen to people drone on about how the Halo movie isn't actually BAD, it's "so bad it's good" and you have to turn your brain off to watch it, just like Doom - a movie so bad it gives puppies cancer. EVEN IF THEY DIDN'T WATCH IT.

    Accept that there's a preconception that videogames are a sub-standard form of storytelling, or at best for children, and the people who make these movies will always think that way when making the movie version. The intellectual bar will be set somewhere around the same level as an ant's bollocks, and we'll all scratch our heads at how - during the whole process of building sets, casting actors, putting stuntwork together and getting the sound and camera people in place before turning the cameras on for the very first time and calling "Action!", did no-one think to point out that the script was a load of old shite someone knocked up in their tea break.

    Masterthief: seriously, man - get out more.

  • MasterThief #49 6 years ago

    @ Bumsex Superking

    Oh, what a negative outlook on life you have. I feel sorry for you, to be so cynical. The funny thing is, I agree with much of what you say. Hollywood just doesn't take videogame source material seriously. That's why we get shite like the Resident Evil films, whose setting and story are almost unrecognisable from the games. Almost as if the makers decided that the world that Capcom created is not 'sophisticated enough' for them to adhere to, unless it receives a makeover first.

    However, this has clearly not been the case with the Halo film. The script, for one, was written by a top scribe, in conjunction with Bungie. Peter Jackson, self-confessed geek, is a Halo fan. Fox and Universal are behind it. What other game movies had such esteemed distributors? Final Fantasy and Resident Evil don't count, because they were distributed by Sony pictures. I'll leave you to work out the significance of that.

    Basically, I am not saying that Halo will be great. What I am saying is that if it is rubbish, it will not be for the want of trying. Hey, many films turn out to be cack, even with all the will in the world. Halo will not be immune from mediocrity. But, at least this film is being taken SERIOUSLY, for once. It is a proper big budget event. Not the small-time crap that game movies often are. This one is 'proper' Hollywood. Let's see how good it can be, eh?

  • NegativeZero #50 6 years ago

    @ Bumsex Superking

    Actually, the setting for Halo is ripped off from Iain M. Banks' 'Culture' novels, specifically Consider Phlebas. Also a very large amount of the setting and plot for Halo has been lifted straight out of Bungie's previous (and IMO superior) FPS trilogy Marathon.

    The people who are worried that they might show the Chief without his armor had better start biting their nails, because if they are adapting Fall of Reach then they'd go over his backstory. The first half of the novel deals with John-117 as a child, the development of the Spartan II program, and so on, up to the Pillar of Autumn arriving at the Halo at the beginning of the game. To my mind it's probably not long enough on its own for a feature-length movie, though. I'd expect that they'd cover most of that quickly, and spend the rest of the screen time covering the game itself.

    I must admit I'm a bit worried about what he's said about changing the covenant. I hope if he does try changing them in a major way, Bungie and MS smack him down like a red-headed stepchild. It's fine to modify them a little, but they're an important part of the setting and fiddling with them will make the movie inconsistant with the game, something that won't make anyone happy in the end.

  • Retroid #51 6 years ago

    "hence complaints like - people fly in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon therefore it sucks"

    Which isn't true.

    It sucks because it's a rubbish film. Hero kicks its arse :)

  • Hughes. #52 6 years ago

    @ Bumsex Superking, best rant I've read in ages loev. Thank you.

    Who cares whether I agree or not when phrases like "- a movie so bad it gives puppies cancer" are used.