Remember who Charles Schneer is? Perhaps not. From 1955 to 1981, he was Ray Harryhausen's producer on all those cool fantasy films.

Gale Anne Hurd? Joel Silver? Jerry Bruckheimer? Tsui Hark? All producers that have released incredibly cool slates of films for us happy hungry filmgoers.

You know... As I sit around pondering what is in the future. And from where will it come... I find myself thinking of the same groups of people over and over again. And in a way... it can kind of get you depressed. There always seems to be the same people bringing us the cool stuff... there aren't very many new players.

Now this is where it gets kinda funny. This new player, isn't really so new... he's just wearing a new hat. For longtime readers of the site, folks that go back to when I posted those designs for STARSHIP TROOPERS... well, you'll remember that I was quite a fan of a certain Executive. Yes... it can happen. I mean... I think as a whole... we like Michael Deluca... but on a whole... we don't run into too many cool executive types. The first one I ran across was the head of TRISTAR... Chris Lee.

Well, now TRISTAR doesn't exist... and when I'd bring up his name with folks around the Sony lot... it seemed as though he were retired or something. Well, while I was out in L.A. this week (doing talks about my T.V. show, details to remain secret till a firmed up development has taken shape), I was looking through the sacred Scooby Book, and realized, that while I had Chris Lee's phone number... I had never dialed it.

So... bored in my Hotel room.... I twisted the ol rotary and engaged the line. Next thing I know, I'm supposed to meet his Chris... the meeting was this morning before my flight back to Austin.

I can say... with absolute confidence... Chris Lee's SUPERMEGA MEDIA is where it's happening. You've been following one of his productions already... this... little FINAL FANTASY movie. Unfortunately he couldn't show me anything on it... allegedly there's some sort of fantastic SHOWEST reel that'll be ready in March, and in February the Final Fantasy Film Website will go live with HOPEFULLY, a super high res Quicktime 4 preview of some of the work they're doing. What interested me in talking with Chris today, was... while he was interested in the balls to the wall cool factor... He was really much more focused on nailing the stories. Bring on strong screenwriters... not forcing them to really 'stay in the pre-fab lines'. From what he's talking about... it seems he's in the process of making this 'digimation' (sound like DYNAMATION anyone?) thing fly. This whole photorealistic stories go. I remember the films I thought would be coming after I first saw AKIRA and GHOST IN THE SHELL. I thought something like MATRIX was going to happen when LAWNMOWER MAN and JOHNNY MNEUMONIC came out... Well.. I was hoping.

Well, from what Chris is talking here... We'll be seeing in 2001 with FINAL FANTASY... the beginning of actualizing for people the dream they had after those two films. And in typical confident future action/sci-fi/fantasy movie baron style... he's got a ton of films in various stages of production right now and they all seem.... cool as hell. I'll rundown a few...

Remember that ECKS AND SEVER film I ran down a couple of weeks back? The Wesley Snipes vs Jet Li film? That's another of Chris Lee's SUPERMEGA projects. He found the filmmaker, KAOS in Thailand, where he had made a film (which looks cool as hell from what I saw today) for about half a million that just roared on screen. He had his kinetics down, without seeming like confusion. Gorgeous action work in this little film. BUT... KAOS seems to be one of the 'new' guys that Chris has found and is planning on giving us folks... While FINAL FANTASY will be coming from SONY... ECKS AND SEVER will come out from WARNER BROTHERS.

Then there is Andrew Lau. Who? Well, you see Andrew Lau is a bit of a top secret weapon right now. He directed a Hong Kong film called THE STORM RIDERS that those who have seen it... rave about. The film set all types of box office records in Hong Kong, which he later broke this past year with another film. Well, Chris Lee has gathered him on up for a project called DARKNESS. It’s based on that TOP COW comic of the same name, it’s set up at Columbia and has Chris Morgan writing away on it.. This film, if directed with the same energy and imagination that STORM RIDERS was directed with could very well blow us all away. I’m working on finding the script...as soon as it is done.

Then there’s a project that I’m quite interested in taking a look at called, I, HITMAN. It’s a film being written and directed by a Joseph Kahn (who I can’t seem to place), but I’ve been told that it’s looking to be JET LI’s next film, and will begin production early in 2000 at New Line. From what I know, the film will feature next to no dialogue. The reason? The situations that take place in this film are such, that to talk would mean to give away position.... set off alarms, etc etc etc... Frankly, I’m quite excited by this. If handled right, it could make for a fascinating action film for Jet Li.

SWAT.... Well, you know this project, I’ve been covering it forever. It’s over at Columbia, and is still waiting for a greenlight. The script was fantastic. One of the best pure action ensemble scripts I have read... period. Fortunately/Unfortunately... the project got tied up in the hell that is Arnold Schwarzeneggar... meaning lots of rewrites, delays, schedules, etc. HOWEVER... I’ve heard bumps that this project might get going again soon. Let’s hope.

HIGH SCORE.... Remember when we were hearing all those rumors about a TRON film in development at Disney? Well... It might very well have been this project which is an animated film by Disney that SuperMega is involved with, that takes place in cyberspace. I didn’t get any further information about this project.

NINE RINGS OF THE WU-TANG... this is an anime by the team that brought us GHOST IN THE SHELL and Tab Murphy the writer of Disney’s TARZAN. The production designs on this are quite compelling. The film would take place at some point in the 1100’s China in a world of Magic. This could be a very cool project or just one of those things... I’m not sure. But like I said... the character designs were awesome. And with Production I.G. executing the film... the eye for detail will just be amazing methinks...

HEAVYGEAR.... set up over at Columbia, this is a big film with AMG.... Futuristic knights in heavy duty armor and missles and weapons... basically... that whole powersuit type a thing.

FULL CONTACT remake.... This is over at New Line and is a remake of the amazing Ringo Lam film of the same name. It’s to be directed by KAOS, and is still in the scripting stage. I’m telling you, this KAOS kid is someone to watch. If anyone can find his original Thailand film, I’d love to see it (as I’m sure you would as well) The clips I saw were amazing... I just wonder about the overall storytelling abilitiy which I hope this guy has in spades.

TRANSFORMERS!!!!!!!

Yes, that’s right a film based on TRANSFORMERS. To be done as a live action/photoreal cgi film.... It’s been written and will be directed by this Joseph Kahn fella. I almost left a wet spot on Chris’ couch when I saw he was doing a TRANSFORMERS movie. I mean Christ, that TRANSFORMERS: THE MOVIE with Orson Welles was just one of the coolest things ever. Apparently, the film details the entire where they came from.... how they got to Earth.... Why Decepticons can become dangerous things, and Autobots became passive domestic vehicles. The film will allegedly span something like 250 million years of history and it will have Optimus Prime my friends. AND I CAN NOT FRIGGIN WAIT! AND IT’S SOOOOO FRIGGIN FAR AWAY! This is at Columbia.

EVERQUEST.... based on that big fantasy game of Sony’s.... The film will be done by the same folks (Square’s Digimation) that are bringing us FINAL FANTASY. It will be one gigantic, photorealistic fantasy film. And SUPERMEGA is currently in negotiations with Columbia to take the project. This will be beautiful.

PARASITE EVE.... based upon the Playstation game of the same name, it’ll be co-produced with MADGUY FILMS, and will be down in full Digimation photorealistic CG animation (like FINAL FANTASY and EVERQUEST) and has to do with something coming to earth or evolving on Earth that puts our (humankind’s) existence at risk. Stars a cg female lead and is heavy duty action.

MASTER OF KUNG FU.... that’s right, the super cool martial arts comic from MARVEL that wasn’t Iron Fist. The film just screams to star Jet Li, but that hasn’t been done yet. The director attached to the project at the moment is KAOS (like I said, he’s gonna be a real busy guy) and it is unknown at this time what type of plotline they will follow for the character. Ari Arad from Marvel Comics is going to keep his eye on this one to try to keep some sort of Marvel stamp of quality upon it.

And lastly.... DANNY’S TOY.... a project that seems to be one part BATTERIES NOT INCLUDED... one part GALAXY QUEST.... one part GREMLINS and well... you get the idea. Apparently an alien race comes to earth... only to find that they is wee small. A boy named Danny finds the ‘toy’ and they have to escape the kid, complete their mission and get the heck off earth. It’s going to be a comedy, sci-fi-adventure thingee. And will be made for Sony.

Now... will all these projects work? Probably not, but some will. If the footage from FINAL FANTASY that we’ve all heard about is as wonderful as those describing it say... then at least on those DIGIMATION projects... we’ll be stunned. Also... if the quality of talent attached to FINAL FANTASY (Alec Baldwin, Ving Rhames, Steve Buscemi, Ming Na, Donald Sutherland and James Woods) is any indication of the quality of performers that Chris Lee and his production folks want to pursue... then this could very well be one of the places we most need to focus our attention. And... beyond anything else... They got a friggin TRANSFORMER movie in development.... TOOO COOOOOL!!!! More than meets the eye! They have a website up with some artwork and various cool things up. Check it out! SuperMegaMedia.Com and they told me that just plain ol, SuperMega.Com would be their primary site soon! So.... That’s a ton of new projects to roll over in your minds!