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Rupert Sanders’s Halo 3: ODST Commerical

Posted on Friday, September 4th, 2009 by Peter Sciretta

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Want to get another glimpse at what a big screen Halo movie could look like? Microsoft released a new trailer for the Halo 3: ODST game for the Xbox 360, and it is a live-action production. Directed by Rupert Sanders, a commercial director who was awarded with 2 Grand Prix at the Cannes Festival 2008, nominated for best DGA director in 2006 and 2008, but probably best known to the average Joe as the guy responsible for the Halo 3 Believe , X Box: Joy and that Monster.com ad. You might remember that we previously featured his first-person POV commercial for the video game of X-Men Origins: Wolverine on the site.

Rupert is currently developing feature projects with Warner Brothers and Working Title including the remake of The Wild Geese and Warrior. Last month the Hollywood trades reported that he was in talks to direct The Low Dweller, a “dark ex-con drama” that Leonardo DiCaprio and Ridley Scott are producing.

Watch the trailer after the jump.

IGN:

Youtube:

Thanks to /Film reader Oscar for the tip.

Comments

beirdo

between this and the neill blomkamp stuff, it's great to see there's really talented directors out there who will never make a halo movie that are capable of making a really cool halo movie.

dryanreeb

i completely agree with you. Tell the studios they need to give me a crack at directing this film!

asianrage

Wow, that looks great!

Blake Brown

saw this earlier today, so very cool. are the studios so retarded they can't see the potential a 120-min version of this?

muffin7

I was surprised how poor the lighting was in some of the earlier shots, especially considering how awesome the FX work was. I mean, it looked like the just shined a spot light on the main actor for a few of the shots. Still, overall, this was a pretty fantastic commercial.
The game's pretty good, I got it yesterday (just campaign, no multiplayer). I mean, if you like Halo, you'll like this.

kfizz

check the better quality one on IGN you can never really trust anything on youtube.

mbellerbrock

You got the campaign 16 days in advance? How'd you pull that one off?

octoguy

pirated version. Microsoft is banning everyone who got their hands on in that "early" copy.

mbellerbrock

Ah yeah, forgot about that... make sure you keep your 360 off Live you no good piece of shit.

muffin7

That's why I have 2 360's, one for being a pirate and one for playing games that I actually enjoy.

As for the game, nothing special about it. It' EXACTLY like Halo 3, except there's this lame semi-open world gimmick. Halo needs to either step their game up or jump ship. They seem to be driving this franchise into the ground.

Dan Berry

This was fucking awesome.

Crash Override

Watched this earlier, ejaculated lightning. So awesome.

MightyWizard

I don't think the lighting was poor at all. It seemed clear to me to be an aesthetic choice and I thought it looked most excellent

muffin7

Yeah, maybe. As a cinematographer I'm rather picky and I just didn't like it. But you're right, I'm certain it was an aesthetic choice, just not one that I would have made. But then again, maybe that's not why I'm in the position this cinematographer is...

muffin7

Nah, I watched it in high def on ign, it's no different. I'm talking about basically two or three shots in the beginning, the one where he jumps down and there is some sort of spot light shined on him, the one where they are climbing under the barbed wire and a spot light seems to follow three or four of the actors, and i think there's one more I didn't like. The rest looked fantastic. I just thought that made no sense, where was the light coming from? Is it just standard protocol in the Halo universe to shine spotlights on people during their ODST training?

Name

I think its pretty obvious that it could be a part of the training or whatever, from the quality of the rest of the video you can tell it wasn't from a lack of talent that they chose to use that spot light.

You could say they shine spotlights on the trainees at night in order to blind them, make the environment less predictable, i don't know i'm just making stuff up but that could easily be a reason.

muffin7

All valid points. I just wouldn't have used it because you have to make up what it's there for and it's unnecessary. When you light a scene the way the light hits people should make sense automatically. To me it didn't make sense. To some it might. It certainly didn't ruin anything for me, I just wanted to make a note of it.

Octoberist

I agree with 'MightyWizard'.

I think it was just a creative choice but obviously, it was a non-conventional style that may not tickle some people's fancy.

I get what you're saying: Is the light suppose to be from the camera ala documentary style? Maybe due to the green hue, it's suppose to be a camera filming at night using nightvision. Then if that's the case, why use a spot light too?

Name

Again i think the spotlights could make perfect sense as a tool to disorient the trainees

Name

From a military point of view its most likely used due to training being done in the dark so they can see the movements of the recruits and yes as people have said, as a tool to try to distract them from their training objectives. Also as an observation i would not call it a spotlight id call it a tourch.

Octoberist

it's people like Rupert Sanders, Duncan Jones, Marc Webb and Neill Bloomkamp that tells me that they might be the future of Hollywood, IF Hollywood gives these people a fighting chance.

YoungZer0

Never liked Halo, but this was fucking amazing!

krackajap

I don't get it, instead of shooting the alien he decides to aim for the ship behind him and have it crash on the alien?

muffin7

He did shoot the alien, the ship crashing into him was pure coincidence, at least, that's the way I saw it.

Name

He didn't shoot the ship. It was shot out of the sky and just happened to land on the Brute.

krackajap

Then he's a really bad shot cause there wasn't a mark on the brute.

mbellerbrock

Lol, play ODST, I'm sure you'll find your explanation.

krackajap

Or I'll go play a good FPS instead and forget all about this.

musicsoup

he did shoot the banshee down, because that's just how random playing halo can be. and it just looked cool.

Ben C

Very very cool live-action trailer. I wasn't going to get the game before I saw this, now I'm actually thinking about it. This is what the halo movie should be like.

YoungZer0

Haha, fantastic. Proof that if there is one corp that can build Hype around something than it's Microsoft.

davidtheartist

Really amazing all around. the one thing that wasnt completely working for me was, just like in the blomkamp version, the brutes. They still look unconvincing and digital. The Blomkamp versions i liked cause they had real weight to them and you felt when they hit a guy and his whole body hits the wall like he was just run into by a moose. The effects and style of this one are really really cool though. I love the plains in this one, really took them many levels above what the game had done which is what should happen. The warthog for instance in the blomkamp one looked exactly like the game, which i dont think works. It needs to be made much much better. I think any director who takes on the halo move shouldnt look at the games for a direct resource but rather more like previs. That way it does the game justice and then some.

Name

What is a "CommerIcal"? Title of this post and website address should be changed!

reddevil

Microsoft hear our cries of HOPE. give us HALO the movie! WTF are u wainting for? You are sitting on a golden mine! Make another epic saga for all the people to meet Master Chief, not only the gamers!

South_Texas_Terror

The enemy reminded me of planet of the apes. Can they cast micheal clarke duncan? And the marine training looked like it would today and not futuristic. the training in gi jane looked harder.

davidtheartist

Ya the trainer shoulda been more brutal but i liked how set in reality it was. i think so many futuristic movies changes so much that its no longer realistic but if you look at how soldiers are trained now vs how they were a hundred years ago its generally the same thing. I can imagine in a few more hundred years humanity would still have the same general experience that it is today if it went down the same blind road of war and violence that it currently is. Maybe we will smarten up but otherwise its depicted realistically here.

echo6

I served for 8 years in the Mraine Corps. The training phase was fantastic. Civilians that never attend basic training lack the ability to recognize "brutal" and accurate training. No matter what era, the Corps will fundamentally train its recruits in the same manner. It's mostly a mind-fuck to make a person . . . more capable. One fundamental of the hard-core training is you train to function with the least gear and assets available to prepare a person for extreme circumstances. A good ( but cheesy) example would be in Starship Troopers. It was well portrayed.
MAKE THE FUCKING MOVIE WITH THIS DIRECTOR ALREADY!!!

maxk2010

i didnt like how the brute looked, and lately for halo, the games havent been as cool as the trailers

Gil Brooks

Suits & Brute by Legacy FX (formally Stan Winston Studios). Way rad.

dob

dude. awesome.

watcher

Just like the pictures of Big Macs, the advertising is far better than the actual product.

super_aj

wow this was really cool. I think it might have been better than Blomkamp's stuff.

davidtheartist

I agree, Blomkamp has his own style but this is way more suited to what the Halo movie should be.

saayedalam

i got chills.
P.S. no xbox360 :(

IsaacRosales

As long as a studio is willing to give a fresh/new director the money and artistic liberty to make this movie, it would be a movie I were to be genuinely excited for and in line for during premier night. Just imagine a true/compelling/balls-to-the-wall 45 minute war scene in the Halo Universe. Awesome written all over it! And it would have fanboys (no matter if they are included in the spectrum of geek video game players to fratboys) the world over interested in the concept.

ZQ

While watching the trailer I had a Warhammer 40,000K feel to it. That makes for another excellent movie, imagine Imperial Guard vs Tyranids.. it would be so massive and epic that it would dwarf Starship Troopers or Colonial Marines vs Aliens

Christopher Yee Mon

I just love how strong the commercial is as a short film. In one fell swoop this got me excited about a halo movie and halo odst which most gamers are not excited about in the least.

spoilers i guess
In a minute and a half we get this story of a soldier whose known war his whole life because his father died in the war and that inspires him to join the war effort and we see enough glimpses of his whole life story from his training to first battle where he got his scars to his rise as the leader and apparent father figure of an odst squad. IN A MINUTE AND A HALF!!!

YoungZer0

Could've been his brother.

But i totally agree with you. This is superb storytelling.

cellchild

Rupert Sanders is genius. He has some of the most iconic gaming ads ever including PS3 campaign and Halo Diorama. Can't wait to see him in the movies.

greggorybasore

I know this is gonna sound like a dumb question, but what the hell does ODST stand for?

That aside this was a really great short film. I only hope that the eventual movie version of Halo is this good.

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