'New Moon' Director Calling it Quits?

Source: In Contention, MovieMaker Magazine

With the sure-fire blockbuster New Moon days away from opening, director Chris Weitz has a startling project lined up next: his last. The Golden Compass director and American Pie producer (which he co-directed with his brother Paul, but went uncredited) says that The Gardner may be the capper to his directorial career.

"It’s a script by Eric Essen…It’s sort of an homage to The Bicycle Thief. On the one hand it’s a very small, intimate story, but its implications are very grand," says Weitz. "I’m always looking for my last film, where I can put the brush down, and this is the one…It’s a beautiful story…I feel that I have now spent a decade of my life in training to know how to make films—how to accomplish every aspect of it—and I feel that if I were to do this one film, I’d feel okay just sitting back and reading. I’d really like to read some books."

Continuing, Weitz explains his fatigue further. “Every time I make a movie I’m pretty much convinced it’s the last time I’m going to be able to do it and that really it’s a rather silly occupation to undertake,” he says. “But I think I have maybe one more film in me.”

Following the success of American Pie, the brothers co-directed the Chris Rock comedy Down to Earth and the critically acclaimed romantic comedy About a Boy before splitting off into separate projects (Paul went onto direct In Good Company and American Dreamz, and this year's Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant ). The Golden Compass only grossed $70 million in the US against a $180 million budget, but The Twilight Saga: New Moon can be expected to break box office records when it opens this Friday.