Australian filmmakers Stuart Beattie and Robert Luketic are returning home within the next six months to film their latest projects.
Beattie, writer and director of last year’s highest grossing Australian film at the local box office: Tomorrow, When The War Began, will shoot I, Frankenstein in Australia – a film based on a DarkStorm Studios graphic novel by Kevin Grevioux.
The film, which originally had Underworld: Rise of the Lycans director Patrick Tatopoulos attached at the top, will bring back classic monster characters such as Frankenstein's Monster, The Invisible Man and Dracula. It will be produced by Hopscotch Features' Andrew Mason (Tomorrow).
When announced in March that the film was going to be written and directed by Beattie – who wrote the Pirates of the Caribbean series and Collateral – and that it was going to be shot around September/October, it sparked confusion about the Tomorrow sequel. It is still unknown if he will direct the follow-up to the massive local film, which was also scheduled to be shooting in September.
Luketic, known for directing such films as Legally Blonde, 21 and Killers, will shoot his first ever major Australian feature – Brilliant, which is being described as a cross between James Bond and My Fair Lady.
Both Hopscotch Features' projects were confirmed by Hopscotch Films’ managing director Troy Lum at the Australian International Movie Convention. He told IF that Australian locations hadn’t been decided on but more information would be known in a few weeks.
Lum said on Thursday that the company – which was bought by Entertainment One earlier this year – would now be able to release bigger films more often (such as Pan's Labyrinth) due to an increase in content investment.
“One of the things that I really want to make clear is [that] Hopscotch is still going to do what we do best – we’re still going to buy films simply because we love that picture,” he told the movie convention audience. He said the output deal with Lakeshore Entertainment, announced in June, would guarantee 3-4 studio-sized wide releases each year in Australia.