With all the recent hubbub surrounding Avengers: Age of Ultron casting and the Batman vs. Superman movie’s shifting release date, news about another extremely high-profile sequel – Star Wars: Episode VII – has been unusually slow over the past few weeks. Although we haven’t heard much about the film lately, that certainly doesn’t mean that director J.J. Abrams and others from Walt Disney Pictures, Lucasfilm and Bad Robot Productions aren’t hard at work in pre-production.
During a brief conversation with The Wrap, Abrams confirmed that work on the new Star Wars is well underway, and that the film’s script, co-written by Abrams, Toy Story 3 screenwriter Michael Arndt and original series scribe Lawrence Kasdan, is finally complete. “We’re working really hard and we’ve got our script and we’re in deep prep,” he said. “Full steam ahead, y’know.”
Full steam ahead is certainly right, if Abrams is to have any hopes of having the rabidly anticipated blockbuster ready for its planned December 2015 release date, as no cast has currently been confirmed. In fact, only one character has been confirmed to appear in the new series – determined droid R2D2.
Abrams did reveal, however, that Breaking Bad actor Jesse Plemons has been in talks for a role, but the notoriously secretive director downplayed the gravity of Plemons’ involvement thus far:
He is one of the actors that we’ve talked to, yeah. But, you know. It’s not often that I read about actors that I’m going to be meeting … that I get to read articles about actors who are going to come in. And so I get to see someone and say, ‘Oh, I read that I’m going to see you.’ … It’s usually agents talking to people about what’s happening. It’s a lot of noise.
Even once Abrams locks a cast into place, filming for a huge movie like Star Wars: Episode VII will also be an undoubtedly complex task, despite the director’s backing in effects-heavy blockbusters like Star Trek and Star Trek Into Darkness. And so, you certainly can’t fault him for trying to make things easier on himself. When asked about whether he’d shoot the movie in IMAX, Abrams confirmed he’ll actually be shooting Star Wars: Episode VII on film.
In the right situation I would [shoot on IMAX]. The problem with IMAX is it’s a very loud camera. It’s a very unreliable camera. Only so much film can be in the camera. You can’t really do intimate scenes with it. It’s slow. They break down often. Having said that, they’re working on digital versions of these and so there may be a version one day. But we’re going to be shooting this next movie on film.
Is bringing the Star Wars franchise back to the big screen a promising proposition, or would you rather the series had been left in the past? And what do you make of Plemons as a possible protagonist for Episode VII? Sound off in the comments section!
Star Wars: Episode VII will blast into theaters on December 18, 2015.