So who is Aeon Flux? Peter Chung's barely-clad huntress started out as several shorts on MTV's Liquid Television that were then spun off into a whole show under the same name in the mid-90's. It was a genre defying but short-lived series that was neither anime nor American, yet had heavy influences of both. In many of the episodes we followed the mysterious woman, an independent agent of the Monican Republic who fights against the Breen, an opposing culture governed by the smooth talking Trevor Goodchild. Aeon herself had a tendency to wear skimpy clothing, smooch and ultimately die - a lot.

Now, with video game and books being done to death - the time has come to try out the TV animation field and so Paramount and MTV have joined forces to create "Aeon Flux", a major live-action motion picture starring this year's Oscar winning actress Charlize Theron in the title role. Last week I visited the various sets in Berlin and got to chat with the lady herself, director Karyn Kusama and many of the major players involved during the 54th day of production on this 62-day shoot.

Today comes the first in a series of five reports examining the movie which looks quite different and somewhat more stylish than you might expect. I, like many others unfamiliar with the source material, went in with pre-determined expectations. A cult sci-fi show about a female acrobatic mercenary in a near-future style society? A woman in a tight black outfit with black hair? Judging from what little has come out so far including the single photo it all sounded like a "Dark Angel" meets "The Matrix" derivative clone. Why in the world would an Oscar winner like Charlize and the director of "Girlfight" be doing such a film?

The answer became clear to me on the ground. Much like the series, this isn't a movie that's going to be easy to define. It's a lot more intellectual, stylised and in many ways creative than I had imagined. Are there changes from the show? Most certainly, but it feels like it all remains loyal to the elements that made the show popular whilst still keeping many of the details that fans will get off on. In many ways the feeling I get about this production are the same I get in regards to the upcoming "Constantine" - it's going to be something quite different and more interesting than many audiences are going to expect.

In any case forget the dirty giant industrial complexes or "Blade Runner", "Mad Max" style post-apocalyptic worlds. The world of "Aeon Flux" is that of Bregna, a giant walled city filled with stylised rooms and functional facilities with sweeping curved walls and gardens that can kill. Still, despite the outwardly pretty looks this is a totalitarian state where freedom and multiculturalism are dirty words.

It's in this world we find Aeon. The long and lanky Theron is dressed in a black lycra body suit with a corset like back, semi-transparent arms, gloves, short dark and cut hair, black eyeliner and a three stripe open front. It's an outfit that's far more practical than that in the show, and yet still retains a form-fitting sexiness. Her living quarters are a dark curved room consisting of a hole in the wall for a wardrobe, a glowing window, and a bed curtained by rather thin steel chains. It's functional yet twisted in a S&M kind of way, an interesting place to say the least.

Her aim in the film of course is to find and essentially bring down the city's dictator Trevor Goodchild (Marton Csokas) and help liberate the city. Many of the sets on display we saw were related to Goodchild himself. His living area is a rather Asian-influenced modern abode with a curved purple bed, wooden elliptical windows/doors, a floor hatch, liquor, and strangely shaped lounges alongside some personal touches including ibis paintings and a record turntable. His laboratory combines light distorting walls, exotic plants of many varieties and a colourful meth lab style work area. His library contains rows of books, and a picturesque large vault containing a portal.

Yes you heard right, portal. This film uses portals though not wormholes or flashy tunneling effects like we're used to, but rather a living kind of instantaneous transport method. In this very tastefully minimalist environment the pulse of biological life seems to sit in the background and will have a big effect on the film toward's the end.

Indeed, much of the action around the film's 2/3 mark seems to revolve around a sectioned off piece of Bregna that the only way to get to is through a garden full of aggressive plants including lethal pods that shoot poison. Another place that is of interest nicknamed 'the wine terrace' is where Aeon goes for a kiss with a mysterious stranger. Her outfit is subtly changed for this (a semitransparent hood covers all but her lips) and while we never get to see the stranger, it is a star cameo that people will likely be able to figure out.

The most unique set on display was The Relical. From the outside it looks like a trilobite-shaped spaceship with jellyfish-style netting hanging from its belly. Inside however is an amphitheatre designed like a topographical map meets an open cut coal mine - it's purely sharp layers of golden stairs smoothly converging and yielding a very eye-popping environment. Also worth looking out for is a strangely shaped monorail system.

Being in Berlin lent itself to use of some locations that have never been shot on film before, not even in the likes of the recent "The Bourne Supremacy" which stuck mostly to major thoroughfares of the German capital. This is a city that 15 years on from the tearing down of The Wall is still defining itself with a unique blend of the very modern concrete and glass world with the spirit of the 20's when Berlin was at its best.

Amongst the locations they used were a 400 year old Baroque-style canal/tunnel structure never seen on US film before for a girl-on-girl fight scene, the San Souci palace, the Buga Park Wall, the Chapel of Reconciliation, the Bahaus Museum, a real life Biosphere and the Anatomical Theatre where Charlize has meetings with a flame-haired Frances McDormand in a white glowing ethereal realm called Handler Space.

There's a prison called the Panopticon based on the famous blueprint by Jeremy Bentham where an observer can observe all prisoners without the prisoners being able to tell if they are being observed or not - thus conveying a "sentiment of an invisible omniscience". It's also a reference to the Time Lord's citadel in "Doctor Who".

Shooting on the movie mostly took place at the famous Babelsberg Studios. Beginning in 1912, this was the biggest European studio facility in existence at the time and was home to several Fritz Lang films including the groundbreaking "Metropolis". Throughout the 20's many major filmmakers worked here including a then little known man by the name of Alfred Hitchcock. Then of course came the Reich and the facility unfortunately turned into the headquarters for the Nazi propaganda machine - churning out around 3000 films related to Hitler's regime.

Sitting dormant for many years, it got a new lease of life in the 90's and now is home to a variety of television and feature productions. Amongst the movies shot in the studio since its re-opening are "Enemy at the Gates", "The Pianist", "Taking Sides", "Around the World in 80 Days", "The Bourne Supremacy", "Beyond the Sea" and the upcoming John LeCarre adaptation "The Constant Gardener".

Right now though it's home to the final few days of shooting on "Aeon Flux". In further chapters we'll go into the injury to Charlize that caused a sudden halt to production, what the other actors think of their characters, what Director Karyn Kusama essentially aims to do with this piece, how the writers and producers solved the difficulty of adapting such a complicated work, and more.