A Stunning First Look at Sandy Collora's "Hunter Prey"

Fanfilm auteur Sandy Collora is a legend. In 2003 he released a tiny-budget short about Batman (Dead End) whose gritty stylishness anticipated Dark Knight by years. Now his first original feature, Hunter Prey, is finished - and we saw it.

I don't want to spoil Hunter Prey for you too much, but suffice to say it's a twisty thriller that will remind you a little bit of Enemy Mine and (surprisingly) of Treasure of Sierra Madre. There is no "treasure" per se, but Collora's tale of shifting loyalties among a group of aliens and their prisoner - stranded after a crash on an alien world - brings to mind classic movies about desperate, selfish men in who would rather die than work together to survive.

Shot on a microscopic budget in Mexico, the film's concept design is fantastic. Collora's greatest strength lies in creating settings of rich depth and designing characters who simply kick ass. It's easy to forget you're watching what is basically a labor of love when the design is so stunning and cool.

Hunter Prey asks a question that has preoccupied a lot of recent science fiction, from Doctor Who to the new Star Trek movie: When somebody has exterminated your whole planet, what do you do? One of Hunter Prey's characters is the only remaining member of his species, and a large part of the film is about whether he's justified in trying to exterminate the species that committed genocide against his own.

So when can you see it? Collora has just completed the movie, and is working out details on a distribution deal, but hopefully you'll have a chance to look at it in 2010. For now, revel in these exclusive stills from the movie.