Despite Fox and Universal's pullout, it seems that work still continues on the much-awaited Halo film by Microsoft. This much was picked up during an inquiry with Peter Jackson's representative Ken Kamins, who states that MS was currently in the middle of talks with other distribution projects to continue the film.

Kamins further stated that the Halo movie's pre-production was moving along thanks to exec producers Jackson and (Fran) Walsh. The pair are reportedly having the film's pre-prod visual effects done at their studios in New Zealand, Weta Digital and Weta Workshop. Kamins also shed some light on the transaction that caused Universal and Fox's pullout:

What happened was this: Universal, on behalf of both studios, asked for a meeting with the filmmakers just prior to the due date of a significant payment. Basically, they said that in order to move forward with the film, the filmmakers had to significantly reduce their deals. They waited until the last minute to have this conversation. Peter and Fran, after speaking with their producing partners and with Microsoft and Bungie, respectfully declined.

Look on the bright side - at least we know the film hasn't been completely scrapped. We'll let you know if any related info gets picked up in the near future.

With the upcoming release of Bungie's Halo 3, we've become pretty well adjusted to getting updates and information about the game and related products, or so we thought.

After frothing in the mouth for a couple of minutes, we still haven't gotten over the shock of finding out that somewhere in Wellington, New Zealand, they have a fully functional Warthog which was modeled from the game.

(Though we doubt that gun works. Yeah, New Zealand's home to tough folk, but they've always been a nonviolent state - unless rugby union and beer are involved.)

Created by the guys in the WETA workshop, this vehicle sports four-wheel steering, off-road capabilities, and a machine gun on the back. The only thing sweeter, would be if it came with Master Chief, but we doubt that would be happening any time soon. Anyway here's the image of the Warthog, in all its glory.

After staring at this image, we couldn't help but ask two questions: is there a chance that this will be mass produced and what kind of mileage would we get on it?

The Peter Jackson-Fran Walsh executive produced Halo movie, which will create a stir in the summer 2008, finally has a director.

Sitting at the helm of the film will be Neill Blomkamp, a Vancouver-based director of short films and ads. Blomkamp employs a documentary-style, hand-held, cinéma vérité technique, blending seamlessly with naturalistic and photo-realistic computer-generated imagery effects that will mesh well with the Halo movie. Visual effects, miniatures, and creature design and creation will all be handled by Jackson's Weta Digital Ltd. and Weta Workshop, Ltd., known for their Oscar-worthy work on The Lord of the Rings films.

To help you decide if the bigwigs made the right decision in tapping Blomkamp to call the shots for the Halo movie, we will show you a video of one of his work called Alive in Joburg, which depicted a future in which extraterrestrials have become refugees. Let us know what you think through your comments, for now watch and decide.