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James Cameron collaborator to direct Oz thriller

One of James Cameron’s Aussie collaborators is to make his directing debut on supernatural thriller Nulla, the debut feature from Red Rock Pictures’ producer-writer Gary O’Toole.

Simon Christidis ACS was the lead underwater camera operator on Deep Sea Challenge 3D and underwater cinematographer on Sanctum.

Among his other credits he was underwater DOP on Angelina Jolie’s Unbroken and Jonathan M Shiff’s H2O: Just Add Water and second unit DOP on Kimble Rendall’s Bait.

Black Sails’ Rupert Penry-Jones is attached to play the lead, a British soldier and Iraq veteran who sets out to drive from Melbourne to Perth with a buddy, a fellow soldier.

En route there’s a horrific accident. The producer is in talks with an internationally recognized Australian actor to play the co-lead.

Penry-Jones ’credits include Silk, Spooks, Whitechapel and the features A Little Chaos, Match Point and Charlotte Gray.

O’Toole said of Christidis, “This would be his first feature and he is such a visual artist and veteran that we are over the moon about this attachment. I think he's going to bring a visual style to the project that will elevate it to another level.

“Last week we spoke about how, ironically, the ocean and the desert are in fact very similar, in so far that they can both fill a person with an equal measure of claustrophobia and agoraphobia, and he totally got that.”

O’Toole and executive producer Robert Lewis Galinsky are raising the finance and aim to shoot in Australia next year.