Lars von Trier's Melancholia

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He rocked the Cannes Film Festival this year with his controversial horror/art film Antichrist, and now Danish director Lars von Trier is looking to the worlds of science fiction and disaster movies for his next project.

His next feature film will be "Melancholia," a psychological drama-cum-disaster movie.

Budgeted at around E5 million ($7.4 million), the English-lingo film is set for a European 2010 shoot. Casting of international cast is currently under way.

Planet Melancholia, The Hollywood Reporter reports, will be a psychological disaster film with a mix of "spectacular, cinematic imagery with Dogme-style handheld camerawork -- a combination seen in Antichrist."

Title refers to Planet Melancholia, an enormous planet illustrated on the press release that looms threateningly close to Earth.

"No more happy endings!" commented Lars von Trier, who will direct from his own screenplay.

Though lead producer Zentropa Entertainment is not revealing more plot details, the film will not be an alien invasion movie, said Zentropa co-founder Peter Aalbaek Jensen. Production and post are planned for next summer in Germany and Sweden, though Von Trier's business partner Aalbaek Jensen says there will be no mutilated-genital scenes in Planet Melancholia -- that's a change of pace for the director after Antichrist.

"Melancholia," said Aalbaek Jensen, had "come together pretty quickly. Lars von Trier is really happy with the project." It will be produced by longtime von Trier producer Meta Louise Foldager and Louise Vesth ("Zoomers," "Crying for Love").

Zentropa aims to structure the film as a European co-production, using its regular co-production partners on von Trier movies in France, Germany, Sweden and Denmark, plus regular film funds and Eurimages coin, Aalbaek Jensen said.

"As a disaster movie, 'Melancholia' will use some special effects, but nothing compared to Hollywood," Aalbaek said. He added that the picture will be "romantic, in a Lord Byron sort of way."