“Attack The Block” was one of the most thrilling genre debuts in recent years. Seeing a bunch of no-good London kids go up against an alien invasion, it was funny, exciting, surprising, energetic and featured a cast of future stars (it marked the debut of John Boyega, and future “Doctor Who” lead Jodie Whittaker was the female lead too). It should have made director Joe Cornish one of themost hotly sought-after directors around.
Indeed, it did: he was offered projects like “Star Trek Beyond” and “Kong: Skull Island” before turning them down, keen to focus on original fare. And he was developing some exciting prospects: comic-book adapatation “Rust,” cyberpunk tale “Snow Crash,” WW1 spy actioner “Section 6” with Jack O’Connell. But now, nearly seven years on from the movie’s debut, we still sit here without a new Cornish movie, and it’s pretty infuriating.
But fortunately, that’s all changing now: word leaked out earlier in the year that Cornish had a new project brewing, and now Empire have confirmed that Cornish began photography on “The Kid Who Would Be King” earlier this week. And furthermore, some plot details have been revealed: as we suspected, it’s a sort of “Goonies” meets “Game Of Thrones” vibe, with the film focused on Alex, a twelve-year-old British schoolboy who discovers the legendary sword Excalibur and must stop the medieval villainess Morgana from destroying the world.
It’s a set up that could be a bit naff in the wrong hands, but Joe Cornish is very much the right hands for something like this, and we suspect this’ll be a family film that’ll be as much fun for adults as for the kids. And Cornish has his cast sorted out too: young Louis Serkis, the son of Andy, will take the lead, with Dean Chaumoo, Tom Taylor (the lead in “The Dark Tower”) and Rhianna Doris will be his best friends. In terms of more recognizable faces, “Mission Impossible” breakout Rebecca Ferguson will play villain Morgana, and Patrick Stewart will play the older version of Merlin, with up-and-comer Angus Imrie playing his younger counterpart.
20th Century Fox will be releasing the movie, and it’ll hit just over a year from now, on September 28th, 2018. We. Can’t. Wait.