USA Today features pictures and press info on the in-production SF film REAL STEEL. (click on photo for larger view)
Directed by Shawn Levy (NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM), takes place in the near-future setting of 2020, by which robot boxers have replaced humans in the ring.
Hugh Jackman plays one of these replaced fighters, now out of work and trying to bond with the son (Dakota Goyo) he barely knows.
If the story seems somewhat familiar, it’s because it’s based on Richard Matheson’s short story Steel, which was adapted into a harrowing episode of THE TWILIGHT ZONE, starring Lee Marvin as the desperate former pugilist.
The script has gone through many hands, beginning as a 2005 screenplay by Dan Gilroy (FREEJACK), Jeremy Leven (CREATOR), and current screenplay by Leslie Bohem (TAKEN) and John Gatins.
Says Jackman on the plot:
“The heart of the story is this father and son relationship and in comes this junkyard robot called Atom that the kid’s in love with… I abandoned the kid pretty much at birth. But we come together because the boy’s mother has died. We have a lot of distance to make up. It’s through this mutual interest in robot boxing that they find a way to come together and form a bond.”
Not too surprisingly, REAL STEEL is a DreamWorks SKG film for Disney’s Touchstone Pictures.
However, one minor surprise is that the filmmakers went with the expense of building 19 full size, 8-foot tall animatronic robots, for the performers to interact with — at the advice of executive producer Steven Speilberg.
The actual fighting scenes will be realized with digital visual effects and motion capture supervised by boxer Sugar Ray Leonard.
Director Shawn Levy is quoted as saying: “There are some things only visual effects can pull off. But when you give an actor a real thing, in this case a real 8-foot-tall machine, to interact with and do dialogue opposite, you get a more grounded reality to the performance.”
REAL STEEL is due in theaters November 18th, 2011.
See the link Above for more details.
