This robot fortune teller image has nothing to do with Chappie. But it should…
Fresh of Elysium‘s okay but not spectacular number one debut at $30 million, Neill Blomkamp has announced his next project, and it’s not the long-rumored District 10 (though there is a short treatment that exists!) Chappie will be a story of a robot that has AI, and is stolen by criminals who want to use him for bad things. Blomkamp wrote the script with his wife, Terri Tatchell, and describes the film as “RoboCop, but hilarious. If you mixed Robocop with E.T. and it was… funny, that’s what it is.” Blomkamp also says there isn’t any socio-politcal messages, but that the film deals with sentience. (Which could have socio-political messages…)
Chappie will be lower-budgeted and also sees the return of Blomkamp to South Africa. Sharlto Copley will voice Chappie, and the two criminals will be played by Ninja and Yolandi Visser, the two members of the South African rap-rave duo Die Antwoord.