Jon Favreau shows us the first pic from the sci-fi western...

It's about as basic an image as any studio or director could release and still hope to get any publicity out of it, but here, via Jon Favreau's Twitter feed, is the first image from 2011's Cowboys & Aliens.

The film is set to star Sam Rockwell, Olivia Wilde, Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig, if you believe certain rumours and various articles. Hardly a week seems to go by without a Cowboys & Aliens casting rumour being hatched or scotched.

In any case the summer 2011 release is based on the Platinum Studios' graphic novel written by Fred Van Lente & Andrew Foley, and illustrated by Dennis Calero & Luciano Lima, dealing with much the same possibilities H.G. Wells proposed in War Of The Worlds - how would barely-industrialised society cope with a sophisticated alien invasion? The art reminds one of the original 'V' series, wherein horses and tried-and-tested hand-to-hand combat and chicanery were used to defeat superior alien tech.

An interesting cultural point is that the cowboys and apache indians must join forces in order to repel boarders, so there's scope for a pacific subtext too.

Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci, and Damon Lindelof have penned the piece, with Favreau at the helm and Spielberg and Ron Howard among a vast slate of high-end producers.

Total Film

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