For those of you who do not know who Peter Jackson is, I am sure you have seen or at least heard of his films. He is notorious for "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy, "King Kong," "District 9," and recently "The Hobbit" trilogy. His work speaks for himself some may say, but this new upcoming saga he is working on is different from his other films.
A new epic saga
The Sci-Fi adventure film is based on a book series by Philip Reeve. The series is of four books, which is why the trailer states "An Epic New Saga," not a trilogy. The first book of the series "Mortal Engines" is about a futuristic world where cities and towns have been built on moving machines.
After "The Sixty Minute War," Earth becomes a desolate land where later machine cities prey on small-town machines and use them as resources (Interesting thought when in perspective of the world today). The book series first came out in 2001 and "Mortal Engines" won a couple of awards including the Whitbread award in 2002. Don't worry there is still plenty of time to read the first book before the film comes out.
The 'Mortal Engines' trailer
Watch the trailer first before reading this next section. It's less than 2 minutes.
Now the actual trailer itself is quite interesting for those of us who have not read or even heard of the books. It is short for most trailers today and gives us a quick glimpse into the film, and yet it provides us with a lot of information.
It starts off with a single tree and in the film world, a single tree shot represents life. Then out of nowhere, it is crushed and the camera follows the machine to show the vast, deserted land showing that there is very little life. This indicates that something has happened to this world although we see birds and grassy fields around it.
Next is what we perceive to be the main character. Her outfit and her looking through a spyglass gives that steampunk vibe which many people will be fans of.
We then see what she sees which is a giant machine moving fast toward them. The camera glides over the top of the machine, revealing the green gardens and city life on it.
If you look closely you can see "Big Ben" on the machine. The main character also states that it is London that's chasing them. Now if you have never been to London, it is an extremely large city, with a population of 8.3 million people. It has now been shrunk down to this machine and obviously, not everyone can fit in it. The London machine chases the smaller machine until it finally gets it and pulls it inside. There is something a fire behind the smaller machine as its pulled in to the London machine. It's almost as if its going to be burned. The start of the trailer with the tree of life leads to the end of the trailer with unknowing death making for a great attention grabber.
Sci-Fi and punk
Now, for those fans of Studio Ghibli and the game "Dishonored 2", the machines remind me of "Howls Moving Castle," and the main girl in the trailer reminds me of the cover for "Dishonored 2." Both are steam punk style, especially "Dishonored 2" which has a steam punk London vibe to it as well. I have a hunch that this will be a big fan film series and I am excited to see what's coming next. Considering they have posted the film trailer a year out before its release date, which is December 14, 2018, this gives me the impression that there will be more to come through the next year. There should be more trailers, actors, and directors talking about the film, and much more.
The trailer is short, sweet, and to the point and we can expect more to see for this upcoming new Sci-Fi film. Steam punk, Sci-Fi, and Peter Jackson fans will enjoy this film a lot. We will just have to wait and see what will happen next.
