The second half of Sony/Screen Gems' panel consisted of Joe Cornish's British alien invasion flick, Attack the Block, which has already gained a positive reputation internationally as well as in its several American screenings since its impressive debut at SXSW earlier this year. The panel consisted of Cornish, now-infamous colleague and producer Edgar Wright and star John Boyega.
For those unfamiliar, Attack the Block tells the story of a gang of kids from South Loundon who fiercely defend their block from an alien invasion. You can check out the red-band trailer below.
After playing the trailer, a short scene that takes place after the invasion begins showed Boyega and his friends, makeshift weapons in hand in a building crawling with aliens that arrive at the apartment of a drug dealer played by Nick Frost. The scene had some solid scares, humor and quality alienage.
Cornish said he was influenced by a lot of similar '80s stuff such as Gremlins (not unlike how Super 8 was(, so much so that the filmmaking crew jokingly called the film "Super 8*Mile." As such, Cornish didn't want to rely entirely on CGI for the aliens, so he combined old-school effects with rotoscoping.
When asked about a sequel, Cornish said that if it were to happen at all, it would take place immediately after the events of the first film.
Some of Wright's other projects were brought up as well. The director of the popular films Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz was asked about his third film in what's been called the "Blood and Ice Cream" or sometimes the "Cornetto" trilogy with stars/friends Simon Pegg and Nick Frost. Wright said he and Pegg will begin the script for the film, currently titled The World's End, next month.
Of even greater interest to fans, Wright and Cornish have just finished and turned in the latest draft of the long-gestating Ant-Man script for Marvel, so hopefully the studio likes what it sees and begins to put that film into motion. Marvel has a full slate through 2013, so if the project moves forward, Marvel will likely take its sweet time.
Attack the Block, meanwhile, opens in limited release July 29 with expansions expected in August.
