Roger Deakins, who has received a dozen Academy Award cinematography nominations, will join director Denis Villeneuve on Alcon Entertainment’s sequel to “Blade Runner.”
Deakins will be presented with the Pierre Angénieux Excellens in Cinematography Award at the Cannes Film Festival on May 22. Deakins teamed with Villeneuve on Alcon’s “Prisoners” and “Sicario,” starring Emily Blunt, Josh Brolin and Benicio Del Toro, which is in competition at Cannes.
Deakins received his latest Academy Award nomination this year for his work on Angelina Jolie’s “Unbroken.” He was previously nominated for “The Man Who Wasn’t There,” “O Brother, Where Art Thou?,” “No Country for Old Men,” “True Grit,” “The Shawshank Redemption,” “Kundun,” “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford,” “The Reader,” “Prisoners” and “Skyfall.”
The “Blade Runner” sequel is scheduled to start principal photography in the summer of 2016. Hampton Fancher (co-writer of the original) and Michael Green have written the original screenplay based on an idea by Fancher and Ridley Scott, set several decades after the conclusion of the 1982 original.
Harrison Ford will reprise his role as Rick Deckard. Ryan Gosling is attached to star.
Alcon Entertainment acquired the film, television and ancillary franchise rights to “Blade Runner” in 2011 from producer Bud Yorkin to produce prequels and sequels. Yorkin will serve as a producer on the sequel along with Alcon’s Andrew Kosove and Broderick Johnson. Cynthia Sikes Yorkin will also produce.
Ridley Scott directed “Blade Runner” — set in Los Angeles in 2019 — from a screenplay by Fancher and David Peeples. Jordan Scott Cronenweth was the cinematographer.Deakins is repped by ICM Partners.
