James Gunn Unveils Film Project ‘The Belco Experiment’

James Gunn‘s next project as director may be the follow-up to last year’s massive Guardians of the Galaxy, but he’s keeping a foot outside the Marvel Universe as well, announcing a new project he’s written and will be producing for MGM Studios, called The Belco Experiment.

Writing on Facebook, Gunn said that the movie “revolves around the American Belco company in South America which is mysteriously sealed off at the beginning of a work day, and its employees are ordered to kill each other or be killed themselves. This starts an escalation of violence, where we discover the true nature of each and every Belco employee.” Despite this, he promises that it has “the heart and humor my films have all had.”

The script, he explained, was written “a few years ago … in a two-week fugue state binge,” and has been with Jonathan Glickman even before he became President of MGM in 2011. Glickman put Gunn in touch with The Conjuring producer Peter Safran, who is now co-producing the feature. “Jon promised we’d make the film with full integrity — and, so far, MGM has — awesomely — been true to their word,” Gunn wrote.

The movie will be directed by Australian director Greg McLean, best known for his work on the Wolf Creek franchise. “Greg shares my philosophy about honesty in film, and his naturalistic style lends itself to Belco,” Gunn wrote. “The past few weeks we’ve spent working together have been a joy — I don’t know if I’ve ever related to another filmmaker’s sense of aesthetics and love of film more.”

The Belco Experiment starts production in June, in Bogota, Columbia. 

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