10 Film Directors Who Desperately Need A Win

As far as debuts go, District 9 was a hell of a way for Neill Blomkamp to put his name on the map, earning over seven times its budget at the box office and scoring four Academy Award nominations including Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay. At the age of 30, it looked like the South African filmmaker had the world at his feet.

Elysium and Chappie saw the law of diminishing returns begin to set in, with both movies echoing the socio-political subtext and themes found in District 9 without bringing anything new to the table, and despite the latter being released five years ago we're no closer to seeing Blomkamp's latest big screen effort.

During that time, he's focused on his experimental short film company Oats Studios and also tried to mount long-delayed sequels to James Cameron's Aliens and Paul Verhoeven's Robocop, although both projects ultimately fell apart and he doesn't seem to have anything currently in the pipeline.

There's no doubting Blomkamp's talents behind the camera and eye for sci-fi spectacle, but the lack of forward momentum is only going to hurt his prospects in the long run, and he could well be best served jumping into bed with one of the studios as a big-budget hand-for-hire.