Is the Bond franchise finished? It’s an unthinkable thought, but news has emerged today that the latest installment is on hold indefinitely.

The reason it appears seems to be uncertainty over the future of MGM. A statement from producers Michael Wilson and Barbara Broccoli said that continuing uncertainty over the sale of the studio meant production would have to be postponed.

The latest installment is had been due for release in either 2011 or 2012. However with this latest news there is no knowing when Bond fans might get their next glimpse of 007.

It is of course not the first time that the future of James Bond had been in doubt. Despite scoring at the box office, Die Another Day, the last of Pierce Brosnan’s four outings, was mauled by critics and fans alike.

However, Daniel Craig, arriving like a white knight, salvaged the franchise and, with a bold new look, the series looked set to go on forever.

Despite these problems there is no reason to panic – not yet at any rate. Bond will surely survive this blip, but it’s sobering to think even the world’s best spy is not immune to the credit crunch.

Now that 3D has crow barred itself into our lives movie goers will surely be thinking one thing. Surely what we want to see more than anything else is a fourth all singing, all dancing Spiderman movie.

Sadly the third installment arrived a touch too early for our latest cinema phenomenon. Imagine the evil jazz dancing scene in full 3D glory!

Okay, bad example, but like it or not a fourth installment is on its way along with an army of favourite Marvel characters including Captain America and more Iron Man escapades. Now Disney has got its mits on one of the hottest properties in the movie world, they’re determined to extract every last bit of cash they can.

However there is a dark cloud on the horizon and it comes in the form of the children of a Marvel Legend. Jack Kirby worked on some of the most iconic characters to grace the comic and now his children claim they should be entitled to a piece of the action.

They’re not alone. The descendents of Superman Co-creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster are currently involved in a battle to get hold of rights to the DC flagship franchise.

If successful they could get the go ahead to launch rival versions of characters such as Spiderman and Iron Man. For fans still reeling of Disney’s $4bn purchase of the Marvel portfolio, this could be good news – few wanted to see the heritage of Spiderman mix with the DNA of Mickey Mouse and an alternative may prove popular.

One way or another the contest of the superhero heavy weights looks set to be fought out in the law courts of Hollywood.

But it also symbolises the way in which the Iraq war has remained at the forefront of public interest for the wrong reasons. Mainly because the war itself was wrong.

This manufactured war has spawned many films, but The Hurt Locker has become the first Iraq war film to be honoured by the Academy, taking home six statues.

Grossing just $14.7million – small fry for a six-time Oscar winning movie – The Hurt Locker’s success surprised many around the world on Oscar night.

Yet the fact it has made such an impression to the Academy simply echoes the sentiments that people around the globe feel towards the Iraq war, the people of Iraq and those that have lost their lives serving for their country.

Bigelow dedicated her win to those dedicated Military personnel: ‘to the women and men in the military who risk their lives on a daily basis in Iraq and Afghanistan and around the world. And may they come home safe.”

The team from Inflatable film cover the latest screening

Here’s an event for your diaries, but one you might not have thought about. The sixth Rwandan film festival, nicknamed Hillywood, is set to celebrate all things African this July.

This is one of the smaller festivals on the global circuit, but undoubtedly one of the most remarkable. It comes in two parts. First a conventional festival takes place in the capital of Kigali, but what really draws in visitors are the travelling screenings that tour the countryside.

Every year a series of events with a large inflatable screen heads off around small villages in the countryside. It is a remarkable event and draws in thousands from miles around. For many it is the first time they have seen a film let alone one in their own language of Kinyarwanda.

It is a remarkable sight, especially considering the country’s dark past. However things are moving forward rapidly. The films are growing in sophistication and are becoming more accessible to a wider audience. Leading the way is Africa United, a British/Rwandan coproduction which is currently in development.

It’s theme of a group of kids walking from Kigali to South Africa to take part in a skills tournament at the world cup is far removed from the war torn image of Africa, but it fits in with the theme of this year’s festival ‘Africa Celebrated.’

If you’re even remotely interested in film then this event is one of those must-see experiences. It is one of the most beautiful countries in the world and its burgeoning film culture is bristling with imagination and creativity.

For a glimpse of what it’s like visit the website of Inflatable Film http://www.inflatablefilm.com This Seattle based production company is currently working on a documentary going behind the scenes of the festival. They’re about to enter post production and a trailer is up on their site. It’s well worth watching. Meanwhile the festival itself starts on July 11. Visit www.hillywood.org for more information.

I grew up in the 80’s and I saw a lot of those dotted around on TV as a child; obviously that was something to do with the fact that M.A.D seemed to only be one cross word away between the Americans and Russians. Now in the opening decade of the 21st Century, we’ve got an awful lot of negative things going on, people the world over predicting the end and the Mayan 2012 ‘prophecy’ hanging over our heads, so where are the exhibition stands and sandwich boards.

This thought came to me last night when I watched Roland Emmerich’s latest movie ‘2012’ which was loosely (it’s difficult to overemphasise that phrase in this context) on the Mayan prophecy and as is de-rigeur for Emmerich, featured the large scale destruction of almost everything in the world except our intrepid band of everyman and woman heroes.

I wasn’t overly impressed with the film, all told, but it did get me wondering whatever happened to the people wandering around with ‘The End is Nigh’ sandwich boards and exhibition stands. Maybe they’re doing their thing outside FirstGroup’s strike picket.

Anyone who has spent any time on the internet over the last couple of weeks will have found it hard to avoid hearing about District 9, the new quasi-documentary sci-fi film from Neill Blomkamp with production duties handled by everyone’s favourite Hobbit, Peter Jackson.

As a fan of the original short piece, I’d been trying to avoid reviews of the film until I got around to seeing it, which I did last night. In short, it’s good, but the main thing that struck me about it wasn’t the examination of racism which the first half of the film handled, or the way the events of the second half are presented (no spoilers here) but the quality of the handheld camera work and also the high level of the CGI, especially considering the budget.

This film cost ‘just’ $30 million to make. Obviously that’s a ridiculous amount of money in the real world, but compare this to the other summer releases this year: Transformers 2 – Revenge of The ShakyCam had a budget of $200 million; GI Joe had $175 million; and this year’s Harry Potter weighed in at a massive $250 million. Obviously people say that this money goes on name actors, marketing, effects and shooting locations, but most of this summer’s movie budget has gone on CGI.

Here’s the main issue that struck me about District 9 after watching it: for a film that could have been made almost seven times for the amount it cost to make Transformers 2, it looked better. Much better. The handheld camera work, even in the first half’s ‘documentary’ styling, is more stable than any other film of this style in recent memory and even the worst piece of CGI in the film is just as good as anything in Michael Bay’s latest explosion-fest.

Though admittedly, it’s not as CGI heavy as these mainstream summer blockbusters, and there are no ‘name’ actors in it, it’s still tough for me to fathom that a film which cost a small fraction of the budgets afforded most of this summer’s releases walks into the territory typically reserved for big Hollywood releases and gives Optimus Prime a slap. Perhaps District 9 has even more to say than it seems to at first glance.

Based on Grant Morrison and Dave McKean’s 1997 comic series, it’s been looking like Batman might finally get a decent video game to go with his solid film adaptations. Indeed, many fans of graphic novels have been pinning their hopes on this game so that we might finally see some other good comic to game adaptations, rather than the other way around.

Unfortunately, there are rumblings that the early positive reviews may be tainted. Gaming industry journalist and anonymous blogger RAM Raider has a history of ranting about the corruption he sees in the industry and these last couple of weeks have been no exception, especially his ‘Spot the Corruption’ posts.

RAM Raider claimed a few weeks back that several UK gaming magazines already had review code of the game, but were to sit on their reviews until the pre-release embargo passed (basically, no reviews are permitted before the game is released unless the publisher gives permission). RAM Raider said that Eidos would permit certain magazines to lift their embargo if they guaranteed a Batman cover and gave the game a score above 90%.

As with many stories floating around the Blogosphere, this could have been ignored, derided or parodied, but the recent updates have been showing Dark-Knight-adorned covers of several UK gaming magazines and all feature reviews giving the game well above 90% – 96% in GamesMaster’s case, going as far as to call it a ‘masterpiece.’

While I’m not in a position to really say one way or the other, as I haven’t played the full game and am not working in the industry, I will say that I was disappointed by the demo. It looks great, and I really wanted to like it, but it just doesn’t feel like a ‘masterpiece’ to me. Then again, I’ve been wrong about demos before – I loved the UFC demo, for example, but got bored of the game very quickly.

Unfortunately, Eidos have a perceived history of this: it’s widely believed that a similar ‘arrangement’ occurred for a score of 80% or over with the last ‘Tomb Raider’ game.

At the time of writing, Eidos have been quoting denying that this ‘arrangement’ with magazines has occurred, but for me the seed of doubt is planted. Combining this story with the demo is enough to get me asking questions, but I’ll hold judgement until I’ve played the whole game.

Where in the 1970’s and 80’s, the talk was purely of comics, it now seems to be the domain of the summer blockbuster.

With superhero movies dominating the summer release schedules for the foreseeable future, it’s a cool time to be a geek, and this year’s Comic Con attracted 125,000 people, slavering for information and sneak previews.

I didn’t get to go this year, but I watched a lot of the webcasts, so here’s a brief rundown of my highpoints:

1.) Iron Man II: I don’t mind admitting it – I loved Iron Man. Aside from being my favourite Marvel hero, last year’s film trounced every other Marvel adaptation apart from the first two X-Men movies and expectations are high for the sequel.

Judging by the trailer, it’s going to live up to them, although it may suffer from having too many villains the way X3 did. It looks like a good summer movie crammed with great effects, lots of eye candy and plenty of big bangs. I can’t wait.

2.) Tron: Legacy: This one’s a curiosity for me; the original’s 27 years old – how well will a virtual world like that update for a sequel? Jeff Bridges promised that true to the original, ‘Everything’s going to be super-sized’. Judging by the concept art and clip that was shown, it looks like he’s telling the truth.

3.) Avatar: James Cameron wrote this 14 years ago and has been waiting for the technology to catch up to a point where it’s possible to make it. With Cameron’s history of pushing the boundaries of what effects companies can do, it was obvious that this would be something special if he had to wait that long.

Judging by the stills I’ve seen from the clips he showed at Comic Con, it’s going to be a truly spectacular-looking film. He announced that 15 minutes of the film will be viewable for free on August the 21st.

There was plenty of other cool stuff at this year’s Comic Con, including a presentation by Tim Burton on his forthcoming Alice, but those were the highlights that I saw in the coverage.

Keep your eyes peeled for next year’s Comic Con report in which I’ll hopefully be reporting from the actual show.