We’ve already had a teaser for Mortal Engines, but the full trailer debuted at New York Comic Con last weekend before arriving online in all its mechanized glory.
Adapted from Phillip Reeve’s hugely ambitious novel, a Mortal Engines movie has been in the works since at least 2009 – now written by Peter Jackson, Philippa Boyens and Fran Walsh of Lord Of The Rings fame, and brought to the screen by SFX specialist turned debut director, Christian Rivers.
The film stars Hugo Weaving, Hera Hilmer and Robert Sheehan, and the whole thing looks pretty special – coming off like a steampunk fusion of Mad Max, Phillip Pullman books and the weird pirate insurance company section from Monty Python’s Meaning Of Life.
It’s still too early to tell how much of Reeve’s darker, stickier moralities have been preserved in the film – as the trailer pretty much just shows us all the spectacular bits – but it’s not like Jackson and co don’t have a good track record with complex adaptations.
Here’s the official synopsis:
Thousands of years after civilization was destroyed by a cataclysmic event, humankind has adapted and a new way of living has evolved. Gigantic moving cities now roam the Earth, ruthlessly preying upon smaller traction towns. Tom Natsworthy (Robert Sheehan)—who hails from a Lower Tier of the great traction city of London—finds himself fighting for his own survival after he encounters the dangerous fugitive Hester Shaw (Hera Hilmar). Two opposites, whose paths should never have crossed, forge an unlikely alliance that is destined to change the course of the future.
Mortal Engines is the startling, new epic adventure directed by Oscar®-winning visual-effects artist Christian Rivers (King Kong). Joining Rivers are The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogies three-time Academy Award®-winning filmmakers Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens, who have penned the screenplay. The Universal and MRC adaptation is from the award-winning book series by Philip Reeve, published in 2001 by Scholastic.
On board as producers are Zane Weiner (The Hobbit trilogy), Amanda Walker (The Hobbit trilogy) and Deborah Forte (Goosebumps), as well as Walsh and Jackson. Ken Kamins (The Hobbit trilogy) joins Boyens as executive producer.
If it comes out half as good as it looks, there’s a chance we’ll see this turned into a franchise – with Mortal Engines being the first of four books in a pretty great series (and there’s even a few prequel opportunities after that, if this is really going down the LOTR/Hobbit route).
Mortal Engines opens in the UK on the 14th of December. Check out the splendid new character posters below too:
