Last night we published one of the first descriptions of the super secret teaser trailer for JJ Abrams' Super 8 (you can read that description here, although I urge you to see it on the big screen in front of Iron Man 2 if you have the patience/will power to do so). We now have even more information about the project.
We've previously confirmed:
It is not a Cloverfield sequel or prequel.
It is written and directed by JJ Abrams.
Yes, produced by Steven Spielberg, along with Bryan Burk and Abrams
It will be released in 2011 as an Amblin Entertainment (not Dreamworks) release (Paramount Pictures Distributing, Bad Robot Producing)
This will be an homage/tribute to Spielberg's 1970's/1980's Amblin films, like Close Encounters of a Third Kind and E.T. Imagine combining that with the characters, mystery and supernatural spin of Abrams.
And it takes place in the late 1979.
I've seen the trailer and it really does feel like a Spielberg film from the Amblin-era, but at the same time you can also see Abrams fingerprints.
New Information:
The trailer was shot independently of the film a month ago, and the special effects were done under the cover of Abrams new NBC series Undercovers
Variety says the film will begin principal photography in Fall 2010.
The film's actual budget is in the range of $45 million-$50 million.
It will be shot traditionally, and not through a handheld Super 8 Camera ala Cloverfield.
It will be released in Summer 2011. The release date could be May 27, 2011. I say this because Paramount, just today, pushed Mission Impossible 4 out of that date, and back to December, leaving the slot open.
HeatVision says that actual movie has something to do with "the possibility that a group of kids in 1979 are playing around making movies with their Super 8 cameras (as Abrams and Spielberg did as kids) and accidentally capture something ... sinister, on film." This certainly gels with Vulture's original theory on the trailer.
