After months of radio silence over the status of John Carter of Mars, news is finally beginning to trickle out as the production ramps to shoot at the end of the year.
Utah daily The Salt Lake Tribune is reporting that John Carter of Mars, a joint production of Disney & Pixar directed by Andrew Stanton (Finding Nemo, WALL-E), will shoot in Southern Utah for 45 days this November.
Planned locations, including Lake Powell, Moab and Kane and Wayne counties, have doubled as otherwordly landscapes before. The original Planet of the Apes and this summer’s Star Trek both shot in the area.
We knew Carter was planned as live-action, but this is an encouraging sign that it plans to use less green screen than originally thought. Unless this is purely location shooting, with all the actors being shot on green screen and then imposed over the already-shot landscapes, similar to how Disney’s animated film Dinosaur was made.
To fill the otherworldly landscape of Utah, ComingSoon.net has confirmed that X-Men Origins: Wolverine cast members Taylor Kitsch (Gambit) and Lynn Collins (Wolverine’s girlfriend) have joined the cast as the titular Civil War veteran transported to Mars and Deja Thoris, the Martian Queen respectively.
Both were pretty unimpressive in Wolverine, but no one really walked away from that film with much dignity so I’m willing to wait and see.
Are you looking forward to Pixar’s first foray into live action? What do you think of the casting of Taylor Kitsch as the film’s lead?