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Michael Madsen, Rachel Hunter and Jennifer Tisdale are starring in "Nictophobia," a horror thriller being directed by Doug Elford-Argent and produced by David Frank Fletcher Jr.

The story follows a murderer (Madsen) who terrorizes a trio of people who, in real estate parlance, flip properties.

Luckster Productions in associations with 30 Something Productions and Libra-Con Productions are behind the movie.
Michael Madsen has 'Nictophobia'
Actor playing murderer in horror film
Staff report

May 11, 2009, 01:44 PM ET

Michael Madsen, Rachel Hunter and Jennifer Tisdale are starring in "Nictophobia," a horror thriller being directed by Doug Elford-Argent and produced by David Frank Fletcher Jr.

The story follows a murderer (Madsen) who terrorizes a trio of people who, in real estate parlance, flip properties.

Luckster Productions in associations with 30 Something Productions and Libra-Con Productions are behind the movie.

Jean Claude Van Damme and Vinnie Jones will play rival assassins in the action thriller "Weapon" for Flagship Films reports the trades.

Jones will play a master sharpshooter while Van Damme's character is skilled with a knife. The two join forces to take down the head of a drug cartel who is backed by the DEA.

Russell Mulcahy will direct while Alison Semenza and Todd Moyer will produce. Filming kicks off this August in and around Vancouver.

Spanish helmer Jaume Balagueró ("REC," "Darkness") is set to direct the English-language horror thriller "Flatmate" for Filmax says Aullidos.

Plot details on the $16 million project are being kept under wraps but the story is set in New York City and will kick off filming later this year with an international cast.

Balagueró and Alberto Marini will work on the script as Balagueró finishes up post-production on "REC 2".

Warner Bros. Pictures has landed John Hlavin's revenge thriller spec script "The Gunslinger" says The Hollywood Reporter.

"Gunslinger" follows an ex-Texas Ranger who will stop at nothing to find and punish the men who killed his brother and rescue his nephew.

Andrew Lazar is producing.

The Halcyon Company, who're behind the upcoming "Terminator Salvation", picked up first-look rights to sci-fi author Philip K. Dick's estate in 2007.

Now they've selected Dick's "Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said" as the first of his works they intend to turn into a feature film says The Hollywood Reporter.

Set in a futuristic, dystopian world, "Tears" is the tale of a celebrity who wakes up after an assassination attempt to find no one has ever heard of him.

Previous Dick stories have been turned into films with mixed success. For every solid work such as "Blade Runner", "Total Recall" and "Minority Report" there have been some less impressive fare like "A Scanner Darkly," "Impostor," "Paycheck," "Screamers" and "Next".

Halycon co-founders Victor Kubicek and Derek Anderson will produce alongside Dale Rosenbloom and John Alan Simon. Isa Dick Hackett and Laura Leslie will also be involved.

Newcomer Evan Daugherty is set to pen the latest draft of "Grayskull" for Warner Bros. and Silver Pictures says The Hollywood Reporter.

John Stevenson ("Kung Fu Panda") is attached to direct the adaptation of "He-Man and the Masters of the Universe" cartoon series and toy line, which followed a blond warrior named Prince Adam who turns into the heroic He-Man.

He and his allies -- Battle Cat, Man-at-Arms and Orko -- defended their planet Eternia from the evil forces of Skeletor, who tries to conquer the fortress Castle Grayskull, which imbued He-Man with his powers.

Justin Marks penned the previous draft which reimagines Adam as a soldier who sets off to find his destiny, happening upon the magical world of Eternia. There, Skeletor has raised a technological army and is bent on eradicating magic.

While Nu-Image/Millenium wants "V for Vendetta" helmer James McTeigue to takeover directorial duties on the upcoming "Conan the Barbarian" remake, Lionsgate favors three other potential suitors according to CHUD.

The names that have made the mini-majors shortlist include French helmer Christopher Gans ("Brotherhood of the Wolf," "Silent Hill"), acclaimed British genre helmer Neil Marshall ("The Descent," "Doomsday"), and German helmer Marcus Nispel (the remakes of "Friday the 13th" and "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre").

Production kicks off on August 24th in Bulgaria and a star is still being sought for the titular warrior.

Korean production outfit Sidus FNH is set to co-produce a $10m Korean-language remake of 1967 Shaw Brothers classic One Armed Swordsman with Hong Kong's Celestia



Scheduled for release in 2010, the project will be directed by Kim Sung-su whose credits including Musa The Warrior and Running Wild. Celestial owns rights to the 760-title Shaw Brothers library and has been developing a raft of remakes with different companies.

Sidus, which has credits such as box office hits Tazza: The High Rollers and My Scary Girl, has also announced that Choi Pyung-ho has been appointed as CEO of the company, replacing Tcha Seung-jai and Kim Mee-hee who stepped down last week. Choi joined Sidus last October as executive vice president of investment and distribution and before that served as executive vice president of CJ Entertainment.

Under Choi, Sidus plans to produce two to four big-budget films a year, such as the One Armed Swordsman remake, along with US remakes of its own movies.

The company, which is owned by Korean telco KT Group, has also established an international sales arm headed by former Prime Entertainment executive Juyoung Park. It is launching four new titles at Cannes including Kwon Hyeong-jin's drama Wedding Dress, starring Song Yun-ah, and Chu Chang-min's I Love You So, a love story revolving around an elderly couple.

The sales arm will also acquire foreign titles, including theatrical and library product for distribution by KT Group. Sidus previously had an output deal for international sales with Hong Kong-based Golden Network Asia which will continue to work with the company on select titles.

Since merging with KT Group in 2005, Sidus has become a content provider for its parent company's various distribution platforms which span satellite TV, IPTV and mobile. 

The production and investment outfit has also put together several entertainment-related funds worth more than $100m. In 2009, it is planning to release around 25 pictures including 20 foreign films – such as Blood: The Last Vampire,Splice, Spread and Pope Joan – along with five Korean films.

A feature film adaptation of the best-selling French detective novel series "Fantomas" is underway at La Petite Reine reports Variety.

Christophe Gans ("Silent Hill," "Brotherhood of the Wolf") is co-writing the screenplay and will direct the story which follows the ingenious but amoral master of disguise who's also a sadistic killer,

In this $60-70 million film, using both French and English dialogue, Fantomas will face off with a villain of equal or even more dastardly dimensions. David Martinez co-wrote the script,

There are forty three novels in the series published over the past century and the property has been adapted numerous times before for both film and television.

Shooting kicks off later this year or early 2010, pushing back Gans' "The Swedish Cavalier" with Vincent Cassel.

Paul Walker is in talks to play the male lead and Simon West ("Con Air") is in talks to direct the thriller "Protection" says Risky Biz Blog.

The story is about a twenty-one-year-old daughter of a Mexican judge who's targeted by mob types after she sees them kill her father and other family members.

The pair must stay on the run through dodgy places on both sides of the border, while an agent tries to protect her and the bad guy is hot on her trail.

West's involvement depends on his commitment to the remake of the Charles Bronson thriller "The Mechanic". The project is currently being sold at Cannes.

With the Memorial Day weekend opening of "Terminator Salvation" looming, the future of the franchise has become intriguing.
"Terminator" is the only franchise in which the distributors aren't locked in for future films.

MGM has a 30-day right of first refusal to finance and distribute the fifth "Terminator" film, a right earned through the settlement of a lawsuit between the studio and Halcyon partners Victor Kubicek and Derek Anderson. According to sources, MGM has every intention of making a serious play for the franchise, potentially trumping Warner Bros., which is distributing "Terminator Salvation" in domestic territories, and Sony, which is releasing the film overseas.

The distribution drama promises to be a real cliffhanger that will begin once Halcyon delivers its demands to MGM along with a first draft of the screenplay for the fifth "Terminator."

The studio's position was acquired in the bankruptcy of Orion, which distributed the first "Terminator" film, and the settlement of a lawsuit waged against MGM by Halcyon principals Kubicek and Anderson, who charged the studio with trying to block its "Terminator Salvation" deal with WB and Sony. MGM ultimately had a shot at "Terminator Salvation" but passed.

"Salvation" was a much riskier prospect then than the fifth "Terminator" is now. At the time, MGM made its decision knowing only that franchise linchpin Arnold Schwarzenegger wasn't returning, and the studio had only an early script by "Terminator 3" scribes John Brancato and Michael Ferris they developed with "T3" helmer Jonathan Mostow. That script has changed significantly, with uncredited work done by Jonah Nolan, Paul Haggis, Shawn Ryan and Anthony Zuiker. Though Halcyon hasn't yet set a writer for the fifth film, the prospects are strong because McG is returning as director, and Christian Bale will reprise as John Connor.

Halcyon is obligated to give MGM first crack at the fifth film. While some may question whether MGM can afford another big-ticket obligation, "Terminator" would be a strong fit alongside other franchise properties that include two Guillermo del Toro-helmed installments of "The Hobbit," a Darren Aronofsky-directed revamp of "Robocop," the next James Bond installment and "The Matarese Circle," an adaptation of the Robert Ludlum thriller that has David Cronenberg directing and Denzel Washington and Tom Cruise attached to star.

What pricetag would MGM be looking at to get in the game? The third and fourth films each required an investment of approximately $50 million from WB for domestic, with Sony paying in the vicinity of $75 million for overseas rights, which became more expensive on the new film because Sony acquired additional territories from Halcyon, including Japan. Those sums are the negative pickup price and do not include P&A, which they put up separately.

"If 'Terminator Salvation' makes good on its current momentum, it will be one of the most sought-after franchises in town, and every distributor will be studying ways to approach the rights holder," said David Molner, managing director of Screen Capital Intl. "Only time will tell whether pole position is enough for MGM to prevail in that contest."

It's unclear whether MGM will come away with the movie; it is uncertain whether MGM has the right to match a deal that Halcyon might make if MGM passes. MGM could be presented with an outlandish budget projection that it might reject, only to watch Halcyon make deals with another studio at a more reasonable rate. MGM has protections against "bad faith" bargaining that could put the studio and Halcyon back in court if another studio received a more favorable deal than MGM was offered.

There are split opinions on whether MGM would be required to take both domestic and offshore territories. Several sources said the studio would need to take both, but other insiders said MGM can take either piece and invite in partners.

The MGM-Halcyon drama may not play out until a year from now, when Kubicek and Anderson get an early script, but the stakes may well be supremacy for summer 2011 or 2012.

Halcyon declined comment, as did MGM.

Martin Scorsese is bringing Ol' Blue Eyes to the bigscreen.
Universal Pictures and Mandalay Pictures are teaming on "Sinatra" and have brought on Scorsese — who has long flirted with a biopic on singer-actor Frank Sinatra — to direct and produce.

Universal and Mandalay's Peter Guber and Cathy Schulman have been quietly developing the project for two years while they worked feverishly to secure the life and music rights from Frank Sinatra Enterprises — a joint venture of the Sinatra Estate and Warner Music Group.

Phil Alden Robinson is writing the screenplay.

Although no actor is attached to star in the film, Schulman said Leonardo DiCaprio is an obvious candidate because he has become Scorsese's go-to actor over the past decade, having starred in the director's past four features: "Gangs of New York," "The Aviator," "The Departed" and the upcoming "Shutter Island." Because any music in the film will come from Sinatra's recordings, it will not be necessary to cast an actor who is a proficient singer.

The process of acquiring the late entertainer's life and particularly music rights was "very complicated, as you can imagine," Schulman said, because of the multiple parties involved. "The responsibility we are taking on to tell his story — that would cause anyone to be very careful about who they grant these rights to," she added. "Everyone knows that Marty Scorsese is a final-cut director. So there had to be a lot of trust that he would tell this story in a way that didn't destroy (Sinatra's) memory."

Project marks the first bigscreen pic to be made about the Hoboken, N.J., native, whose life provided endless fodder for the gossip columnists because of his tumultuous love affairs, infamous friendships with the likes of President Kennedy and possible Mafia ties. Schulman described the story as an unconventional biopic that will touch on all phases of Sinatra's life.

"My father had great admiration for the talent of the people he chose to work with, and the talented people who worked with my father had great admiration for him," said Tina Sinatra. "It is personally pleasing to me that this paradigm continues with Marty Scorsese at the helm of the Sinatra film."

"We have dreamed of making a movie about Frank Sinatra, and Marty Scorsese is undeniably the perfect vision keeper for this project," said Guber, whose Mandalay shingle has a first-look deal at U.

Gary LeMel, the former president of worldwide music distribution at Warner Bros. Pictures, is exec producing alongside Tina Sinatra and Robinson.

Scorsese and Robinson are repped by Endeavor.

Abel Ferrara is taking another walk on the wild side with a re-imagining of Robert Louis Stevenson's "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," which will be contemporized and titled "Jekyll and Hyde."
Forest Whitaker and Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson are attached to play the lead roles in the classic tale about a doctor who invents a potion that unleashes his violent alter ego.

Glasshouse Pictures' Brett Walsh and Cheetah Vision Films' Randall Emmett are producing; Luc Roeg, Michael Robinson and Andrew Orr are exec producing for U.K. production banner Independent.

Sean Walsh, Bonnie Timmermann and Chris Lighty also receive exec producer credits.

Independent is handling international sales on the project, which will begin lensing in late summer.

"The combination of such formidable talent in front of and behind the camera will turn this wonderful gothic story into a modern classic for a whole new generation," said Roeg.

William Shatner's Gonzo Ballet
(Documentary)
By JOE LEYDON

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A Big Screen Entertainment Group production. Produced by David Zappone, Michael Manasseri, Kevin Layne. Executive producers, William Shatner, Kimberly Kates, Scott Woollery. Directed by Patrick Buckley. Co-directors, Bobby Ciraldo, Andrew Swant, Kevin Layne.

With: William Shatner, Ben Folds, Margo Sappington, Henry Rollins, Michael Pink, Elizabeth Shatner.

William Shatner has spent much of his career being a good sport about accepting -- and, in certain TV commercials, cannily exploiting -- the role of human punchline. But he supplements his trademark self-mockery with heartfelt sincerity, emotional openness and wisps of wistful melancholy in "William Shatner's Gonzo Ballet," a surprisingly revealing doc that suggests the full depths of his self-awareness and -- no kidding -- artistic aspirations. Although too short for consideration as a theatrical item, the docu likely will live long and prosper as homevid and cable fare after a trek through the global fest circuit.

Pic pivots on efforts by famed choreographer Margo Sappington to create a ballet based on spoken-word songs from the album "Has Been," an acclaimed collaboration by Shatner and musician-producer Ben Folds. Helmer Patrick Buckley adroitly intercuts between scenes of dance preparation and performance, interviews with Folds and others involved with the original album -- and, most important, earnestly expressed recollections and recitations by Shatner himself.

The ironically titled "Has Been," Shatner freely admits, was an attempt to demonstrate the seriousness of his musical ambitions years after an earlier album -- "The Transformed Man," featuring spoken-word renderings of "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds" and "Mr. Tambourine Man" -- was jeeringly greeted as an instant camp classic. Obviously still slightly wounded by that reception, Shatner thanks Folds for encouraging him to take another chance at making music -- a gamble that, judging from the evidence here, paid off artistically if not financially.

There's a distinctively autobiographical flavor to the songs Shatner performs as the score for Sappington's lithe dancers. Most notably: "It Hasn't Happened Yet," which finds Shatner still hungry, and vaguely discontented, after all these years; and the album's title track, a seriocomic song of defiance that insists only those who actually achieve something can later be labeled a "has been."

While introing these and other songs, and during the pic's unexpectedly moving final scenes, Shatner comes across as at once playful and pensive, amused and unguarded. Even the actor's worst critics likely will find something to admire in the pic's intimate, affectionate portrait of Shatner as a game risk-taker who, for better or worse, is nowhere near ready to start playing it safe.

Tech values are sharp.

It's official, with the 80's already well plundered it seems the remake boat is moving into the 90's.

StudioCanal and Original Films are planning a remake of the Sylvester Stallone-led 1993 mountain climbing action thriller "Cliffhanger" reports Variety.

In the Renny Harlin-directed original, Stallone played a climbing expert who is forced to help a group of hijackers recover three suitcases containing $100 million lost in the Rocky Mountains.

The film went on to become a major hit, raking in $255 million worldwide and scored generally positive reviews for its impressive action including a mid-air hijack sequence and the famous opening suspense set piece involving a woman whose equipment fails during a perilous climb across a deep chasm.

The new version will center on a group of young climbers and will "feature multiple cliff-face locations". A screenwriter is being sought with production aiming to kick off next year.

Neal Moritz, who is also producing the upcoming "Escape from New York" remake for Warners, will produce.

Monica Bellucci, Guy Pearce and Miranda Otto are set to star in Bruce Beresford's upcoming romantic comedy "Get It At Goode's" reports Screen Daily.

Based on Madeleine St John's 1993 novel "The Women In Black", the story recounts the ups and downs of a group of sales ladies and their families at the high fashion salon of a department store in 1960.

Belucci will play an Italian vendeuse who pursues her goal of success in a new country and brings change and romance to the lives of those around her.

Sue Milliken is producing and the Little Film Company is commencing worldwide sales at Cannes this week.

Shooting is set to begin in October in Sydney.

CANNES -- Jason Statham will star in the $40 million action thriller "The Killer Elite."
Pic will be helmed by commercials director Gary McKendry. It's based on Ranulph Fiennes' bestseller "The Feathermen."

Based on real events, story follows a group of former British special forces members who are being hunted by assassins. Statham will play a former Navy Seal who is forced out of retirement to save his closest friend.

Producers include Joni Sighvatsson, Steve Chasman and Inferno's Bill Johnson and Jim Seibel.

Plan is to begin lensing in fall in London, Paris and Australia.

Deal closed in Cannes on Wednesday night, with Inferno fully financing and handling sales. Pic is packaged by CAA, which reps domestic rights.

French helmer Jan Kounen is teaming up with Anne Paris to helm docu "The Secret History of the Dalai Lamas."
Pic will highlight the Tibetan culture and the history and tradition of the Dalai Lamas from the 14th century to today. It will feature an interview of the current Dalai Lama and various re-enactements.

Penned by Jean-Claude Carriere ("Cyrano de Bergerac"), film is a French-German co-production between Alfred Hurmer's Berlin-based Integral Film and Manuel de la Roche's Paris-based Movie Sphere.

Sharon Stone, who is a Tibetan Buddhist, has come onboard to do the narration.

Kounen will also partner with producer Manuel de la Roche, a former Tibetan monk who also penned and produced "Darshan, L'Etreinte," a doc about Indian spiritual leader Mata Amritanandamayi. "Darshan" opened in Cannes in 2005.

Budgeted at $4 million, "The Secret History" will shoot in September and October and is scheduled for a spring 2010 delivery.

Kounen said the idea for the documentary, as well as "Darshan," sparked from a TV documentary series project he had with De La Roche called "Another Reality," which was supposed to showcase diverse cultures around the world.

"This documentary is a natural following to 'Darshan' " said Kounen, adding, "Cinema allows us to do longer takes and express our subjects' timelessness and philosophy more in depth than what we shot for television. We want this documentary to be a sensorial experience for viewers."

Kounen's "Coco Chanel and Igor Stravinsky," which was just picked up by Sony Pictures Classics for U.S. ditsribution, will close the Cannes Film Festival.

Bellucci


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Kounen pairs with Paris for 'Dalai'
Monica Bellucci has joined the cast of Disney and Jerry Bruckheimer's "The Sorcerer's Apprentice."
She will play Veronica, a sorceress and the long-lost love of Nicolas Cage's character, Balthazar Blake.

Pic, which revolves around a sorcerer who recruits and trains a young protege to help him fight the forces of darkness in modern-day Manhattan, is shooting in New York City with Jon Turteltaub at the helm.

Jay Baruchel, Alfred Molina, Teresa Palmer and Toby Kebbell round out the cast.

Exec producing "Apprentice" are Cage and his Saturn Films partner Norm Golightly as well as Todd Garner, Barry Waldman and Jerry Bruckheimer Films' Mike Stenson and Chad Oman.

Pic is skedded for release on July 16, 2010.

Italian thesp Bellucci, who appeared in "The Matrix Reloaded" and "The Matrix Revolutions," will next be seen here in Rebecca Miller's "The Private Lives of Pippa Lee."

Bellucci stars alongside Sophie Marceau in the French film "Ne te retourne pas" ("Don't Look Back"), which preems Saturday at the Cannes Film Festival.

Focus Features has set Anton Corbijn to direct "A Very Private Gentleman," a Rowan Joffe-scripted adaptation of the Martin Booth novel.

This Is That's Anne Carrey is producing. Production is set to begin in the fall.

Plot involves an assassin who hides out in an idyllic Italian town where he will carry out one final assignment. Going against his usual aversion to human connections, he engages in friendship and romance in the town, a decision that complicates his work.

Corbijn, renowned for work in still photography and videos for rock bands like U2 and Metallica, made his feature directorial debut on 2007's "Control," which chronicled the life of Joy Division lead singer Ian Curtis, who committed suicide at 23. Corbijn received a Golden Camera Special Mention at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival.

CAA reps Corbijn.

A Prophet (Un Prophète)
16 May, 2009 | By Jonathan Romney

Dir. Jacques Audiard. France/Italy. 2009. 150 mins.


When it comes to hard-bitten crime cinema, Jacques Audiard has few equals in Europe, and his violent, gripping prison drama A Prophet shows him extending his range with unimpeachable command. The story of a gauche young inmate who rises through the criminal ranks to become a formidable player, A Prophet works both as hard-edged, painstaking detailed social realism and as a compelling genre entertainment.

The only thing that might hamper commercial prospects is a labyrinthine, sometimes perplexing narrative, but otherwise the film – to be released in France in August - should have the same international appeal as last year's Cannes crime hit Gomorrah. Its unapologetically testosterone-laden tenor will give the film a resonance way beyond the international art-house constituency that embraced Audiard's last film, The Beat That My Heart Skipped. Expect this stimulating film also to be much discussed in the French media in terms of its topical backgrounds, the national prison system and France's Islamic population.

Set largely within prison walls and featuring an almost exclusively male and non-professional cast, the film details the prison career of Malik el Djebena (newcomer Rahim), a 19-year-old man of North African origin but estranged from the Muslim community. Sentenced to six years on an unspecified charge, Malik is chosen by Cesar Luciani (Arestrup), feared kingpin of the prison's reigning Corsican gang, to kill a prisoner named Reyeb (Yacoubi) who initially offers Malik drugs in exchange for sex. Malik commits the bloody murder, and – thanks to Luciani's near-total control of the prison's internal workings - gets off scot-free. This makes him a lieutenant in the prison's Corsican gang, initially entrusted only with menial duties and disparaged as an Arab outsider.

Haunted by visions of a ghostly Reyeb, and determined to get on, the illiterate Malik not only learns to read, but teaches himself Corsican, surreptitiously learning the ins and outs of Luciani's business. Another inmate, Ryad (Bencherif), becomes Malik's friend, later his ally on the outside. When Luciani arranges periods of leave for Malik, entrusting him with various criminal missions, Malik takes the opportunity to do some business of his own, setting up a drugs trade with Ryad's aid. Life gets increasingly dangerous for Malik, both inside and outside prison walls, but he seems – partly through Reyeb's benign, unearthly influence - to lead a charmed life. Powers of prophecy are attributed to him after surviving a bizarre car crash – an incident presaged in an enigmatic fantasy sequence.

Immensely detailed both in its accounts of prison life and of the politics of organized crime, A Prophet comes across as both a realistic film and a deeply cynical one: it is extremely matter-of-fact in depicting a dog-eat-dog world.

Audiard fans may miss the subtler psychological shadings of his earlier films, as well as some of his more fabulist story-telling tendencies and stylistic flourishes. Shot by Stéphane Fontaine with a brutally restricted iron-and-cement palette, this is a business-like film, with a cinematic language as punchy and stripped-down as they come: only a few stylistic frills (the aforementioned fantasy sequence, a blurry iris-style effect evocative of Malik's claustrophobic existence) break the general tenor, and even the occasional visitations of the dead Reyeb are assimilated perfectly, barely compromising the overall realism. Chapter titles and captions identifying key characters help us keep a tab on the film's complexities.

Newcomer Tahar Rahim carries an extraordinary weight, on screen practically in every shot, and proves a mesmerising centre to the film, limning Malik as an unformed, seemingly weightless figure at the start, who gradually acquires considerable depth, forging his personality and mind through hard conscious struggle. Rahim's quiet, seemingly artless charisma makes Malik immensely sympathetic, even though this ruthlessly lucid film makes no bones about the amoral lengths he goes to in the name of survival. A largely unfamiliar cast – very few of them the central-casting plug-uglies usually seem in prison dramas – give the film a flesh-and-blood plausibility, while the weather-beaten Niels Arestrup (who also appeared in Audiard's The Beat...) is formidable and menacing, eventually even vulnerable as the old-guard don.

SALVATION je dobio Variety kritiku:

Terminator Salvation
By JOHN ANDERSON

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'Terminator Salvation'
Christian Bale stars as John Connor in 'Terminator Salvation.'
More than one option

    * (Person) John T Connor
    * (Person) John Connor
      Casting, Casting Director
    * (Person) John Connor

A Warners Bros. release of a Halcyon Co. presentation of a Moritz Borman production, in association with Wonderland Sound and Vision. Produced by Borman, Jeffrey Silver, Victor Kubicek, Derek Anderson. Executive producers, Mario F. Kassar, Andrew G. Vajna, Peter D. Graves, Dan Lin, Jeanne Allgood, Joel B. Michaels. Co-producer, Chantal Feghali. Directed by McG. Screenplay, John Brancato, Michael Ferris.

John Connor - Christian Bale
Marcus Wright - Sam Worthington
Blair Williams - Moon Bloodgood
Dr. Serena
Kogan - Helena Bonham Carter
Kyle Reese - Anton Yelchin
Star - Jadagrace

Darker, grimmer and more stylistically single-minded than its two relatively giddy predecessors, "Terminator Salvation" boasts the kind of singular vision that distinguished the James Cameron original, the full-throttle kinetics of "Speed" and an old-fashioned regard for human (and humanoid) heroics. Only pic's relentlessly doomsday tone -- accessorized by helmer McG's grimy, gun-metal palette -- might keep auds from flocking like lemmings to the apocalypse. The fourth in the celebrated sci-fi series, "Salvation" opens and closes with humanity at war with the machines. In other words, this thing isn't going to end soon. Nor should it, if it keeps on like this.

McG, whose segue from music vids to movies resulted in two "Charlie's Angels" extravaganzas and the woeful "We Are Marshall," exhibits an unexpected flair for the dreadful, abrupt and awesome. What we get here -- which was perhaps missing on the relatively sunny mental landscapes of "Terminator 2: Judgment Day" and "Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines" -- is a sense of real horror: When humans are snatched up like Cheez-Doodles by skyscraper-sized Go-bots, there's no slo-mo relief or stalling. Stuff happens as it might were the world actually overtaken by demonic appliances.

Christian Bale, playing the "prophesized leader of the Resistance" John Connor, may have traded in the Batman body armor for "Road Warrior"-style outerwear, but one thing hasn't changed: He is, once again, a movie star playing second fiddle. Heath Ledger stole "The Dark Knight" away from him and Sam Worthington (who will appear in Cameron's "Avatar" this Christmas) heists "Terminator Salvation" from Bale, for the most ironical of reasons: In a movie that poses man against machine, Worthington's cyborg is the far more human character.

As a steel-beaded logo of Warner Bros. fades away, Marcus (Worthington), on death row for an unexplained crime, gets an 11th-hour visit from Dr. Serena Kogan (Helena Bonham Carter), who wears the headscarf and pallor of a terminal cancer patient. She wants Marcus' body -- literally. She wants to turn him into a cyborg.

Wracked with guilt, resigned to his execution, Marcus agrees to sign the release in exchange for a kiss. "So that's what death tastes like," he says, as she leaves him to his lethal injection.

This is not your governator's "Terminator."

Bale, meanwhile, playing the adult version of the hero-to-be portrayed by Edward Furlong ("Terminator 2) and Nick Stahl ("Terminator 3"), is as purposeful and furious as anyone played by Arnold Schwarzenegger or Robert Patrick. One suspects he's been studying Linda Hamilton in "Terminator 2," although -- let's face it -- this is serious business. It's 2018. Skynet -- the "aware" machine -- has all but accomplished its self-appointed mission of destroying the threat of people.

But pockets of rebellion continue to operate even if, as in the case of a charred and rubble-strewn Los Angeles, the local contingent consists of just two kids: Kyle Reese (Anton Yelchin) and the mute/cute Star (Jadagrace).

Kyle -- given a slightly geeky and perfectly plausible portrayal by Yelchin ("Star Trek") -- will grow up to father John Connor after being sent into the future to meet Sarah Connor (if you haven't followed the "Terminator" time line, this is no time to be catching up).

Thus, he has to be preserved. So does John, given that it's been predicted since 1984 that he'll be the one to save the world. There's a lot at stake.

McG's direction is always intelligent. (He does seem to have a thing for "The Great Escape," which is referenced several times.) The script by John Brancato and Michael Ferris occasionally goes off the rails. Certainly, their insertion of an existential dilemma for Marcus -- "I need to find out who did this to me," he says, his chrome-plated plumbing having been exposed to the open air -- feels very late-inning.

And the obligatory borrowing from the previous movies ("Come with me if you want to live," "I'll be back ...") tend to upset the mood created within McG's bleached-out world, which is very deliberate and doesn't need the comic relief.

There are great bits though: The thrashing, centipede-like, killer-snake thingie, which has the personality of a wolverine, is a neat invention. So are the biker Terminators, which molt like malignant pinecones off their towering mother 'bot. A Schwarzenegger lookalike -- it isn't clear whether it's the ex-actor CGI'd or a complete fabrication -- is funny, but in this case apt.

Production values are enormous, especially d.p. Shane Hurlbut's work and the visual effects by Industrial Light & Magic, Asylum, Pacific Title and Art Studio, and Matte World Digital.



Camera (color, widescreen), Shane Hurlbut; editor, Conrad Buff; music, Danny Elfman; production designer, Martin Laing; art director, Troy Sizemore; set decorator, Victor Zolfo; costume designer, Michael Wilkinson; Terminator makeup/animatronic effects, John Rosengrant; sound (Dolby Digital/DTS/SDDS), Mark Ulano; sound designer/supervisor, Cameron Frankley; visual effects supervisor, Charles Gibson; visual effects coordinator, Bill Sturgeon; visual effects, Industrial Light & Magic, Asylum, Pacific Title and Art Studio, Matte World Digital; stunt coordinator, Tom Struthers; associate producers, Bruce Franklin, Steve Gaub, April Janow, Anjalika Mathur Nigam, Don Zepfel; casting, Justine Baddeley, Kim Davis Wagner. MPAA Rating: PG-13. Reviewed at Warners Bros. screening room, New York, May 14, 2009. Running time: 116 MIN.

Agora
(Spain)
By TODD MCCARTHY

'Agora'
'Agora'
An Mod Producciones, Himenoptero and Telecinco Cinema production with the participation of Canal+Espana. (International sales: Focus Features International, London.). Produced by Fernando Bovaira, Alvaro Augustin. Executive producers, Simon de Santiago, Jaime Ortiz de Artinano. Directed by Alejandro Amenabar. Screenplay, Amenabar, Mateo Gil.

Hypatia - Rachel Weisz
Davus - Max Minghella
Oreste - Oscar Isaac
Ammonius - Ashraf Barhom
Synesius - Rupert Evans
Theon - Michael Lonsdale
Aspasius - Homayoun Ershadi
Cyril - Sammy Samir
Olympius - Richard Durden
Isidorus - Omar Mostafa
Medorus - Oshri Cohen
Pierre - Yousef Sweid


The mother of all secular humanists fights a losing battle against freshly minted religious zealots in "Agora," a visually imposing, high-minded epic that ambitiously puts one of the pivotal moments in Western history onscreen for the first time. Alejandro Amenabar's first feature since "The Sea Inside" five years ago foreshadows the transformation of the Roman-dominated ancient world into Christian medieval times through the story of the much-celebrated astronomer and mathematician Hypatia in 4th-century Alexandria. This elaborately produced English-language Spanish production is consistently spectacular and features enough conflict and action to make it marketable, but a certain heaviness of style and lack of an emotional pulse could pose problems for mass audience acceptance, at least in the U.S.

"Agora" has more on its mind than most costume pictures, and most other films, for that matter -- mankind's place in the universe, the human need to understand the cosmos and the debate over the existence of a single deity. The central dramatic event is the sacking of Alexandria's fabled library, the repository of "all the knowledge of the world" up to that time, and the parallel drawn between early-day Christian fundamentalists, who have just been legalized by the Roman Empire at the story's start, and a certain other religion's present-day fanatics is entirely clear. These issues and more echo throughout the story, which unfolds in a physical rendering of Alexandria that is vivid and extensive in its display of fabulous architecture, divide between the haves and have-nots and polyglot nature of one of the ancient world's great melting pots.

The rational eye of this intellectual and religious hurricane is Hypatia (Rachel Weisz), who, as the daughter of the library's head Theon (Michael Lonsdale), is permitted to teach an elite class of students. Devoting herself entirely to brainy pursuits, the serious beauty has sworn off men, although there are two young fellows who crave her, student Oreste (Oscar Isaac) and her personal slave Davus (Max Minghella), a closet Christian with a bright mind. Hypatia stiff-arms her admirers' advances in no uncertain terms, which pushes Davus definitively into the arms of the believers.

At tale's launch in 391 A.D., the most conspicuous Christians are the firebrand Parabolani cult, who rant in the public squares and even burn a prominent Roman. Led by the articulate, charismatic Ammonius (Ashraf Barhom), they in time become the faith's enforcers, intimidating regular citizens and converting the disenfranchised until they greatly outnumber their Roman rulers. Costumers have done a good job distinguishing this mob from everyone else by dressing them in gray-blue robes, and their group-think m.o. is at one point even made to resemble the behavior of ants.

Hypatia prefers to spend her time in the library, where scrolls of parchment are stuffed onto racks in a magnificent chamber, and pondering such matters as the movement of the Earth and the planetsand whether or not the Earth is flat or round .

Throughout the film, Amenabar pulls back from worldly pursuits to gaze upon the cosmos, and Alexandria's and the world's meager place within it. Still, two or three such visualizations would probably be enough, as the repetition weighs things down .

Strife between the Parabolani and the Jews is used as an excuse by rising cleric Cyril (Sammy Samir) to slaughter and drive out the Jews, and pic's midway climax sees the Christian hordes overcoming Roman resistance to take the library and destroy its contents. This profoundly depressing development is tough to get over, but Hypatia, having made off with a few documents, persists in her research in more cloistered circumstances.

While the dramatic sweep of events gives "Agora" a natural momentum -- under the increasingly dictatorial hand of Cyril, the Christians won't give up until all the Romans are converted and opposition is erased -- the personal dramas never really connect with the desired force. Partly, it's because the two younger men proposed as potential matches for Hypatia aren't remotely in her league; moreso, however, it's because Hypatia is pretty remote herself, with her head in the intellectual clouds and oblivious to the political realities thrashing beneath her feet. Weisz goes a long way to drawing the viewer to her, but Amenabar and co-scenarist Mateo Gil haven't entirely cracked her dramatization.

Minghella, whose character retreats far into the shadows during most of the second half, and Isaac, whose Oreste eventually becomes Roman prelate of Alexandria, have trouble emerging as strong figures. The actors playing heavies enjoy far greater opportunities, so the male cast standouts are Barhom as rabble-rouser Ammonius and Samir as the dictatorial head of the Alexandrian church.

Dramaturgical shortcomings aside, there is much in the picture to sustain sympathetic interest, including its dedicated historical perspective, intellectual seriousness and credible presentation of epic film elements that have often tripped up filmmakers in the past. Then there is the physical side of the production, which is genuinely impressive. Lensing entirely in Malta, Amenabar has fleshed out real locations with extensive sets and helpful (and largely undetectable) CGI extensions to provide a striking impression of a legendary ancient city. Production designer Guy Hendrix Dyas has mixed traditional Greco-Roman style buildings with Egyptian motifs and various interior decorative influences to palpably evoke a Mediterranean port city where many cultures convened. Gabriella Pescucci's costumes colorfully support this approach, and Xavi Gimenez's widescreen lensing captures it all with colorful mobility. Dario Marianelli's score is rich, with occasional swells into the bombastic.



Camera (Deluxe color, Arri widescreen), Xavi Gimenez; editor, Nacho Ruiz Capillas; music, Dario Marianelli; production designer, Guy Hendrix Dyas; supervising art director, Frank Walsh; costume designer, Gabriella Pescucci; sound (Dolby Digital/SDDS/DTS), Peter Glossop; sound designer, Glenn Freemantle; visual effects supervisor, Felix Berges; visual effects, El Ranchito Visual Effects; special effects supervisor, Chris Reynolds; stunt coordinator, Jordi Casares; line producer, Jose Luis Escolar; assistant director, Javier Chinchilla; second unit director, Gil; second unit camera, Oscar Faura; casting, Jina Jay. Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (noncompeting), May 17, 2009. Running time: 141 MIN.
(English dialogue)

Cannes
Tsar
(Russia)
By DEREK ELLEY
A Profit Cinema, SPL Film Production production, in association with Bank of Moscow. (International sales: Rezo, Paris.) Produced by Pavel Lungin. Executive producers, Vasili Bernhardt, Olga Vasilyeva. Directed by Pavel Lungin. Screenplay, Alexey Ivanov, Lungin.

With: Pyotr Mamonov, Oleg Yankovsky, Aleksandr Domogarov, Alexey Makarov, Ivan Okhlobystin, Ramilya Iskander, Anastassia Dontsova, Aleksandr Ilyin, Oleg Sokolov.

Less lugubrious than his previous movie, "The Island," but still laden with Russian brooding and violence, Pavel Lungin's "Tsar" is a brief peep into Ivan the Terrible's heart of darkness via a conflict between the regent and the head of the church. Terrific lead perfs by Pyotr Mamonov and Oleg Yankovsky keep the movie rolling along after a slow start, interspersed with gripping, bloody action. But despite handsome production values and rich, atmospheric lensing by Clint Eastwood regular Tom Stern, this is a heavy meal to digest outside the fest arena.

Story opens in the 1560s, when Ivan IV (Mamonov, all beaky nose and glowering eyes) is already falling deeper and deeper into religious mysticism; haunted by how he will be called to account at the Last Judgment, he has become paranoid about enemies all around him. In "The Tsar's Prayer" -- the first and least involving of the pic's four chapters -- he is already an all-powerful tyrant with a feared secret police, nicknamed "The Tsar's Dogs," which includes the flashing-eyed tsarina, Maria Temryukovna (Ramilya Iskander).

When the current metropolitan, or head of the Russian Church, resigns in protest, Ivan calls on his childhood friend, Filipp (Yankovsky, dignified), to take over the job. This is one of immense power in Orthodox Russia, and especially under Ivan, who has bloodily promoted the cause of Christianity against Islam threatening his borders. Warning Filipp that he must always serve the tsar and Russia first, Ivan persuades him to accept the post.

Conflict between the two soon arrives in the second section, "The Tsar's War." While inaugurating a church he calls "the New Jerusalem" with an elaborate cleansing ceremony performed by virgins, Ivan hears the city of Polotsk (in modern-day Belorussia) has been lost to the advancing Poles. Flying into a rage, he orders the commanders to be impaled and their horses hacked to pieces.

Filipp gives shelter to them but is forced to give them up to Ivan's torturers, who extract "confessions" of cowardice. Filipp himself is spared, but when he refuses to endorse their death sentence,, Ivan simply has them torn apart in public by wild bears.

Though the religious background is different from that of either "A Man for All Seasons" or "Becket," and the setting is much darker and more violent, the conflict between Ivan and Filipp spins on the same issues of duty vs. friendship and loyalty to the regent vs. loyalty to God. The extra wrinkle in "Tsar" is that Ivan has replaced religious conviction with fanaticism, megalomania and mental instability, bolstered by unlimited power wielded with a Russian ruthlessness.

Pic can also be read as a comment on more contempo Russia, though Lungin is on record as saying he had Stalinist Russia more in mind.

In the briefest seg, "The Tsar's Sacrifice," Filipp refuses to recognize Ivan's authority, and the latter arrests him for treachery and impiety. In the concluding "The Tsar's Fairground," Ivan enters the final stages of madness and sadism.

With its telescoping of events, pic is more impressionistic than strictly historical, and features few literary-style debates between the two protags. But the medieval flavor is viscerally captured by the movie's look and design, bolstered by a heavy, Mussorgsky-like score by Yuri Krasavin of repeated, shifting chords.
More than one option



Camera (color, widescreen), Tom Stern; editor, Albina Antipenko; music, Yuri Krasavin; art director, Sergey Ivanov; costume designers, Natalia Dzubenko, Yekaterina Dyminskaya; sound (Dolby Digital), Stephane Albinet, Dmitri Nazarov. Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (Un Certain Regard), May 17, 2009. Running time: 123 MIN.

Najzad da se nešto anticipated snima kod nas...

http://dobanevinosti.blogspot.com/2009/05/stranci-opet-u-raju.html

sjajno, znači, lungin ga je opet napravio – JEDVA ČEKAM!

ali ovim bolidima iz varajetija trebalo bi zabraniti da sami prikazuju filmove nastale iza gvozdene zavese (srbija included) jer im hronično prilaze sa pogrešnim očekivanjima i/ili nerazumevanjem te neizbežnim predrasudama prema slovenima; pazi samo ovog: ---" unlimited power wielded with a Russian ruthlessness".
WOW!
znači ima neka surovost koja je baš 'nako tipićno ruska?
tipićno amerićki!

baš kao i bolećivost&kukavičluk kad treba prozvati islam, odnosno "a certain other religion's present-day fanatics".
IZVESNA – WINK-WINK, NUDGE-NUDGE- RELIGIJA, koju nećemo imenovati...

Cannes
Antichrist
(Denmark-Germany-France-Sweden-Italy-Poland)
By TODD MCCARTHY

'Antichrist'
'Antichrist'
A Zentropa Entertainments23 ApS presentation of a Zentropa Intl. Koln GmbH, Slot Machine, Memfis Film Intl. AB, Trollhattan Film AB, Lucky Red, Zentropa Intl. Poland co-production, co-produced by DR, Arte France Cinema, ZDF-Arte Group Grand Accord: ARTE G.E.I. E, Film i Vast, SVT. (International sales: Trustnordisk, Copenhagen.) Produced by Meta Louise Foldager. Executive producers, Peter Aalbaek Jensen, Peter Garde. Co-producers, Lars Jonsson, Madeleine Ekman, Andrea Occhipinti, Malgorzata Szumowska, Ole Ostergaard. Executive co-producers, Bettina Brokemper, Marianne Slot. Directed, written by Lars von Trier.

(English dialogue)

Lars von Trier cuts a big fat art-film fart with "Antichrist." As if deliberately courting critical abuse, the Danish bad boy densely packs this theological-psychological horror opus with grotesque, self-consciously provocative images that might have impressed even Hieronymus Bosch, as the director pursues personal demons of sexual, religious and esoteric bodily harm, as well as feelings about women that must be a comfort to those closest to him. Traveling deep into NC-17 territory, this may prove a great date movie for pain-is-pleasure couples. Otherwise, most of the director's usual fans will find this outing risible, off-putting or both -- derisive hoots were much in evidence during and after the Cannes press screening -- while the artiness quotient is far too high for mainstream-gore groupies.

Admittedly made in the wake of a severe depression two years ago that left the director wondering if he'd ever be able to shoot another film, "Antichrist" starts with a stunning rendition of a tragic domestic occurrence. To the accompaniment of a Handel vocal piece on the soundtrack, gorgeous slow-motion black-and-white widescreen images record how a toddler falls to his death from a high apartment window on a snowy day while his oblivious parents make love nearby. Mindful to warn viewers that they can never know what they're going to see in a von Trier film, the helmer obliges by sticking one hardcore insert shot in this sequence.

Dividing the narrative into four chapters bracketed by the prologue and an epilogue, the helmer switches to color as the mother (Charlotte Gainsbourg)leaves more than a month's hospitalization and enters into the care of her husband (Willem Dafoe), a professional therapist. In one of her quieter moments in this chapter, entitled "Grief," the woman triggers a calm argument, accusing her mate of indifference over their son's death, even as she assumes responsibility for it. So capably does the man seem to guide his wife through her trauma that the line becomes blurred as to whether he's functioning more as husband or therapist, as he semi-jokes, "Never screw your therapist," when she gets frisky.

After the woman is pushed to confess that she's most afraid of their property deep in the forest -- where the she spent part of the previous summer alone with her son -- that's where hubby take her. This chapter on "Pain" actually charts the woman's self-proclaimed recovery, but ends unpromisingly with a disemboweled fox rising out of the ferns to announce, "Chaos Reigns."

The ante is upped, and a climax of sorts is achieved, in "Despair," reassuringly subtitled "Gynocide," and if one is uncertain as to what the latter means, rest certain von Trier will graphically illustrate it. Suffice to say the woman's mental health takes a turn for the worse, she vividly pleasures her man in a conspicuously unwelcome manner and then, apparently inspired by images of medieval torture inflicted upon women, finds a way to impale him that Hollywood's leading torture-porn experts will kick themselves over not having dreamed up first.

But the woman generously saves the most gruesome, preferably unwatched act for herself in the final chapter, the title of which, "The Three Beggars," provides no revelations worth waiting for.

Offering the opposite of hope for anyone aspiring to recover from grief through therapy, analytical or experiential, and perhaps distantly inspired by the marital battles in Strindberg, "Antichrist" does not even raise the possibility of healing through religion, leaving the title to seem rather arbitrary and more than a little pretentious. Moreover, the blood-smeared sensationalism smothers what serious thoughts the script serves up in passing, just as the sexual interludes detract from the film by playing peek-a-boo and making you try to figure out what's real and/or how it was faked.

Looking very good, Dafoe maintains his dignity most of the way with a performance of seriousness and tact, while Gainsbourg veers between sullenness and extreme histrionics. Only people to appear in the film aside from the lead actors are the little boy and some extras near the beginning and at the end.

Pic's strong physical values include ace lensing by Anthony Dod Mantle in two styles, the shimmering monochrome of the bookends and the more rugged, often hand-held work in the cabin and on the densely green mountain locations; although the film was shot in Germany, the nominal Seattle-area setting is suggested by internal evidence.

End credits dedication to the late Andrei Tarkovsky was greeted by laughs and catcalls in Cannes.
More than one option

   

Camera (color, widescreen), Anthony Dod Mantle; editor, Anders Refn; production designer, Karl "Kalli" Juliusson; art director, Tim Pannen; costume designer, Frauke Firl; sound (Dolby Digital), Andre Rigaut; sound designer, Kristian Eidnes Andersen; visual effects supervisor, Peter Hjorth; visual effects, Plastige Image; line producers, Sanne Glaesel, Johannes Rexin; assistant directors, Mike Elliott, Richard Styles; second unit camera, Stefan Koupec; casting, Leo Davis, Victoria Beattie, Antoinette Boulat. Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (competing), May 17, 2009. Running time: 105 MIN.

Van Nuys, Calif. (Vocus/PRWEB ) May 15, 2009 -- Riley Steele™, an exclusive contract star for adult film studio Digital Playground, is cast in "Piranha 3-D", a 3-D remake of the 1978 cult, horror classic. Scheduled for a March 2010 release, "Piranha 3-D" is produced by the Weinstein Company owned Dimension Films and directed by one of the new kings of horror, Alexandre Aja ("Mirrors" and "The Hills Have Eyes" remake). The current estimated budget for "Piranha 3-D" is listed at $24 million. Riley Steele landed the role of Crystal, one of the leading parts with substantial scenes, and will act alongside an all-star cast featuring Oscar nominated actress Elisabeth Shue ("Leaving Las Vegas", "Hollow Man"), Oscar winner Richard Dreyfuss ("Jaws", "The Goodbye Girl"), Jerry O'Connell ("Jerry Maguire"), Ving Rhames ("Mission: Impossible I-III", Dina Meyer ("Saw II-IV"), and Kelly Brook ("The Italian Job"). "It's crystal clear that Riley Steele adds yet another dimension to 'Piranha 3-D'," says producer Mark Canton. "Her natural beauty will light up the screen as she frolics with the hordes of spring break partygoers in our very contemporary, scary 3-D movie."

Bradley Cooper ("The Hangover") is in talks to play Lt. Templeton "Faceman" Peck in the upcoming film version of "The A-Team" reports IESB.net.

Asked over the weekend about the rumors, Cooper said "That's out already!? Wow. Yeah...its Joe Carnahan's. It's very interesting. It'll be cool. It will be cool [to] see what...He'll make a great movie out of it."

Dirk Benedict played the character in the original. Carnahan helms this new take on the classic 80's series which hits theaters next June.

Peter Berg ("The Rundown," "Hancock") is in talks to direct a big-screen version of classic Hasbro board game "Battleship" for Universal Pictures says The Hollywood Reporter.

Jon and Erich Hoeber ("Whiteout," "Red") will pen the script for "an epic naval action adventure" though plot details are being kept underwraps.

Brian Goldner and Bennett Schneir are producing. The film joins the likes of "Monopoly," "Candy Land" and "Ouija Board" as other classic board games becoming films.

Matthew Sand ("Ninja Assassin," "The Red Star") is set to rewrite the WW2 drama "Brothers in Arms" for Alcon Entertainment says The Hollywood Reporter.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Anthony Walton penned the non-fiction book about the only black U.S. tank unit to fight in Europe during the Second World War.

The unit overcame prejudice and sought to prove themselves on the battlefield by spearheading the Allied Forces' drive eastward toward Germany during the Battle of the Bulge and liberating nearly three dozen towns along the way

Denzel Washington is attached to direct as well as produce alongside Broderick Johnson and Andrew Kosove. David Chisholm and John Sayles wrote previous drafts.

Director George Miller is gearing up to shoot the fourth film in the ground-breaking Aussie road warrior franchise, industry sources say.

Scouting for locations is under way for the movie, which many thought would never get off the ground.

It could go into production later this year.

But it's highly unlikely Gibson will be asked to take his leathers out of mothballs to revisit the role that made him an international star.

Two years ago, Miller said he considered the Hollywood heavyweight too old to play the avenging road warrior.

"It won't be Mel. He was 21 when he made the first one, now he's a lot older and his passion is for film-making and directing," Miller said.

"I don't think he is into acting and I don't think he would be interested in being involved at all."

Miller suggested he was considering a new, young star.

Cannes
Round Da Way
Lascars (Animated – France-Germany)
By LESLIE FELPERIN
A Millimages France, Studio 37, France 2 Cinema (France)/Toon's and Tales (Germany) production, with the participation of Canal Plus, with the support of Eurimages, CNC in association with Cinemage 2. (International sales: BAC Films Intl., Paris.) Produced by Roch Lener, Philippe Gompel. Executive producer, Emmanuel Franck. Directed by Albert Pereira-Lazaro, Emmanuel Klotz. Screenplay, Alexis Dolivet, Eldiablo, IZM, based on the series by Eldiablo, Dolivet, Numero 6, Cap1.

It's summer in the city, the jokes are dirty and the milieu mildly gritty in the urban, adult-skewed French animation "Round Da Way." Based on a popular TV series that started in 2000 on Canal Plus and morphed into a comicbook, pic follows the adventures of various ghetto-dwellers on the make in the sexual as well as criminal sense. A fun, polished crowdpleaser that depends a lot on its target aud's knowledge of street slang, "Round" should assemble a good-sized posse of supporters locally when it opens in mid-June this year, but may not achieve much more than cult status offshore.

Story is set in a rough banlieue (poor suburb, the French equivalent of a ghetto) on the edge of an unnamed big city that sounds, judging by the accents, like Paris. Key characters Tony Pepperoni (voiced by Vincent Cassel) and Joe Hustleton (rapper-comedian and co-writer IZM) hatch plans to earn enough dough for a vacation on the tropical island of Santo Rico.

Tony's scheme involves retailing five kilos of cannabis lent on credit by ruthless dealer Zoran (Gilles Lellouche), but if he doesn't come up with the cash in exactly a week, he's dead meat. Meanwhile, Joe gets a gig building a sauna in the house of wealthy judge Nomercy (Francois Levantal), which also entails minding his employer's palatial mansion while he's on vacation -- an attractive option, given that Joe has major hots for Nomercy's daughter Clemence (Diane Kruger).

Pic spins a complex skein of subplots around the core duo, involving, among others, Tony's love-crazy, controlling g.f. Manuella (Frederique Bel), two sex-starved hood rats (Omar Sy, Fred Testot, aka Omar et Fred) who hide out in a tropic-themed swimming pool for a week when they fail to make it to Santo Rico, the makers of a porn film, and a toy poodle called Tekewinkee.

Although the film has a lot of swearing and gags that often hinge on sex or bodily fluids, there's little here that would earn the pic anything harder than an R rating. Nor is the humor anywhere near as satirical and scathing as, say, "South Park" at its best (or worse, depending on your point of view). Think instead "Beavis and Butt-head" meets "La Haine." Collaborating helmers Albert Pereira-Lazaro and Emmanuel Klotz (the latter's credits include the animated feature "Duck Ugly") notably demonstrate both visual flair and storytelling skill.

Combining simplified, exaggeratedly stylized 2-D characters with richly textured 3-D backgrounds and effects, the animation is aces throughout. Effective soundtrack contributions from such old-school hip-hop crews as A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul and House of Pain add appeal.

For the record, the French title is "Lascars," denoting a slang word that means something like "niggers," but with less derogatory connotations. Also, the names in the original version are different from those cited here (which are culled from the pic's subtitles and press notes): "Tony Pepperoni" is "Tony Merguez" in the pic's spoken French, while "Joe Hustleton" is "Jose Frelate," and so on. Theoretically, pic could be redubbed fairly easily for offshore territories, but that wouldn't necessarily make it much more commercial.

Camera (color); editor, Thibaud Caquot; music, Lucien Papalu, Nicholas Varley; production designer, Patrice Suau; animation director, Thomas Digard; layout and design, Max Braslavsky, Philippe Dentz, Julien Le Rolland; sound (Dolby Digital/DTS), Bruno Mercere, sound editors, Bruno Gueracague, Sylviane Bouget. Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (Critics' Week), May 17, 20009. Running time: 91 MIN.
Voices: Vincent Cassel, Diane Kruger, Omar et Fred, Gilles Lellouche, Diam's, Frederique Bel, IZM, Hafid F. Benamar, Franck Sinius, Vincent Desagnat, Francois Levantal, Eric Judo.
(French dialogue)

Hugh Hudson will direct the bigscreen adaptation of George Orwell's "Catalonia," with Colin Firth and Kevin Spacey attached to star. Arclight Films is repping the film at the Cannes market.
Hudson ("I Dreamed of Africa," "Chariots of Fire") will direct from a script by Bob Ellis.

Orwell's book revolves around the real-life story of how he and his wife Eileen traveled to Barcelona to fight Stalinism. There, Orwell joined the Anarchist brigade and fought in the Spanish Civil War. Film will highlight the relationship between Orwell and Georges Kopp, the charismatic commander of the brigade.

Al Clark is producing with veteran French producer Alian Sarde and Fernando Meirelles through his Brazilian company O2 Films.

Clark was co-producer on the last film adaptation of an Orwell book, "1984," toplining John Hurt and Richard Burton.

Sarde's credits include Roman Polanski's "The Pianist" and Mike Leigh's "Vera Drake."

Hudson is scheduled to begin lensing in the first half of 2010 in England, Spain and then Buenos Aires, Montevideo and Uruguay.

Tapping into the growing trend toward biopic and gangster fare in Gaul, French paybox Canal Plus is co-producing and co-financing "Ilich -- Story of Carlos," a $18 million three-part series about the Venezuelan terrorist Ilich Ramirez Sanchez.
Penned and helmed by high-profile Gallic director Olivier Assayas ("Clean"), series started shooting in January with Venezuelan thesp Edgar Ramirez ("Che: Part One") in the lead role.

Assayas, whose films "Clean," "Demonlover" and "Les Destinees Sentimentales" have competed for a Palme d'Or, has never worked in TV before.

Daniel Leconte, topper at Paris-based docu and film shingle Film en Stock, developed the idea for a TV series. Assayas then conceived making a separate feature film based on the series.

For the first time, StudioCanal had teamed up with Canal Plus from the project's initial stage to package "Carlos" into a movie as well.

"It is a risky bet," explained Leconte, who said he had the idea of making "Carlos" after watching George Clooney starrer "Syriana." "But there's no reason why we couldn't make an ambitious film dealing with complex characters or contemporary issues that touch on politics."

Per Assayas, it's the success of "Public Enemy Number One" that has helped lift French directors' inhibitions about making films dealing with recent history and real people.

"Not long ago, the idea of making a film about Carlos would have scared French producers," Assayas said. "But nowadays I sense that we're being encouraged to make films that have a contemporary dimension."

The helmer, however, explained that the film is more intricately dramatic than political.

Skedded to air on Canal Plus in early 2010, the three-parter is shooting in French, German and Arabic and in various countries including Austria, France, Germany, Hungary, Lebanon and Morocco.

While filming the series, Assayas is writing an original script for the "Carlos" film and will deliver it to StudioCanal in September.

"We sold 'Red Riding,' a British TV trilogy but this is even more ambitious: We're selling two products from the same inspiration," said Harold Van Lier, Studio Canal's international sales topper.

Van Lier said the idea of packaging the project as a TV series and film together helped StudioCanal find co-producers and raise the budget.

Backed by Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg and German Federal Film Fund (DFFF), the miniseries and pic are co-produced by German shingle Egoli Tossell Film  and Madrid-based shingle Morena Films.

Gallic shingle will start pre-selling the miniseries and film at the AFM and is shooting for theatrical release in late April, in time for the Cannes Film Festival.

"Assayas has a well-established cinema circuit that makes the production very ambitious and will likely propel the film under an international spotlight," said Van Lier.

Fox will make its first foray into China production when Fox Intl. Prods. (called Fox Star in India and Asia) teams with John Woo and Terence Chang to produce "King's Ransom," with Woo protege Patrick Leung in talks to direct.
The script was generated under a previous first-look deal with Woo and Chang's Lion Rock Productions banner. The "King's Ransom" pact includes a new first-look deal for Woo and Chang to make Chinese-language films in China.

A caper film involving two circus acrobats and a love triangle, the script has been at 20th Century Fox since 1997, when it was expected to be directed by Woo. The film never made it out of development, until Fox Intl. Prods. president Sanford Panitch identified it as one whose concept would travel.

Leung was second unit director on "Red Cliff" and "Hard Boiled," and first assistant director on "The Killer." He doesn't yet have a deal, but Chang said he and Woo feel Leung is the ideal choice, since he has directed numerous films in Hong Kong and China, including Mandarin-language pictures.

"The last draft of the film by Peter Iliff was in Atlantic City and Brooklyn, but that can be replaced by Macau in the Southern part of China without much difficulty," said Chang. "Once a film is successful, everybody starts doing the genre, like the way they are making historical period films like 'Red Cliff.' I don't think there has ever been a big-scale caper movie (in China). This would be the very first, and with three young leads, this will appeal to a young audience."

Fox Star will require a co-production partner, because studios cannot themselves distribute their films in China. The Woo-directed "Red Cliff" was made with China Film Group, and Chang said they will find a partner and a writer to re-imagine the script for its new locale. Fox Star is entering the arena at a fortuitous time, Chang said, though shooting in China can be a challenge.

"It's certainly cheaper, and while there are good DPs and the art departments are strong, there are some weaker departments and we have to train those younger people," Chang said. "Bringing in people isn't cost effective; that didn't work out because of the language barrier."

The move comes as FIP targets China as a potentially important emerging marketplace for films. By year's end, there will likely be only 4,000 screens to service a population of 1.2 billion, but Chang said theatrical expansion is happening so quickly that there could be twice as many theaters by the time "King's Ransom" is complete.

Cannes
Vincere
(Italy-France)
By JAY WEISSBERG
An 01 Distribution release (in Italy)/Ad Vitam release (in France) of an Offside, 01 Distribution presentation of a Rai Cinema, Offside (Italy)/Celluloid Dreams (France) production, in collaboration with Istituto Luce. (International sales: Celluloid Dreams, Paris.) Produced by Mario Gianani. Executive producer, Olivia Sleiter. Co-producers, Hengameh Panahi, Christian Baute. Directed by Marco Bellocchio. Screenplay, Bellocchio, Daniela Ceselli, based on the book "The Secret Son of Il Duce: The Story of Albino Mussolini and His Mother Ida Dalser" by Alfredo Pieroni.

With: Giovanna Mezzogiorno, Filippo Timi, Fausto Russo Alesi, Michela Cescon, Piergiorgio Bellocchio, Corrado Invernizzi, Paolo Pierobon, Bruno Cariello, Francesca Picozza, Simona Nobili, Vanessa Scalera, Giovanna Mori, Patrizia Bettini, Silvia Ferretti, Corinne Castelli, Fabrizio Costella.

Momentous events require suitably powerful storytelling, which vet helmer Marco Bellocchio delivers in "Vincere," the little-known story of Benito Mussolini's ill-fated first wife and son. Conceived as grand opera set inside delineated space, it's a thrilling, at times brilliant piece of staging that never forgets the emotional pull of either the tragic personal tale or the ramifications of history. Structurally and tonally, the pic opens like "Gotterdammerung" and moves to the more ruminative "Siegfried," which means auds might feel the last quarter loses steam, but the arthouse crowd will still flock, at home and abroad.

That's partly due to an unquestionably great story, which only recently come to light. Opening shifts between Milan, 1914, and Trent, 1907, the years when Mussolini (Filippo Timi) was a Socialist union organizer loudly asserting God's nonexistence. Following a fleeting meeting in Trent, the beautiful Ida Dalser (Giovanna Mezzogiorno) rekindles her fascination with the bold rabble-rouser on the eve of World War I, when Mussolini switches sides and goes from pacifist to hawk.

Ida's attraction to the demagogue is palpable -- where she's hungry for his larger-than-life personality, he's positively voracious for power. During their forceful sex scenes, Mussolini keeps his eyes fixed forward, as if he's pounding the future itself to break through his fears of mediocrity.

When Ida sells all her possessions to fund her lover's new newspaper, the rise of Fascism is set into play. Bellocchio stages one of his most stunning scenes as Mussolini incites a riot in a cinema between pro- and antiwar partisans, accompanied visually by newsreels from the battlefield and by the piano accompanist's bellicose scoring.

By 1915, Ida had a son, Benito Albino Mussolini, and a still-missing marriage certificate, but soon she learns her husband has married Rachele Guidi (Michela Cescon). From then on, Mussolini distances himself from Ida, and ensures she and her son are kept away. At first subjected to near house arrest at her sister's home, Ida is then thrown into an insane asylum, where she furiously writes to Mussolini, the Pope and others demanding her marriage be recognized.

Bellocchio convincingly imagines Ida as a woman obsessed nearly to the point of lunacy, but she's also completely aware of what she's doing. Her madness becomes both foolhardy and tragic; without minimizing Mussolini's pomposity or headlong grasp for power at all costs, Bellocchio refuses to demonize the root of Ida's obsession.

In political terms, the script is keen to present Il Duce as a man strikingly devoid of a moral compass. Bellocchio makes Mussolini's alliance with the Vatican particularly clear, and shows how his move from vocal atheist to papal supporter ensured both his jettisoning of Ida and his grip on the reins of government. Pic's title, the imperative form of "Victory," comes from Il Duce's rousing speeches, geared to mobilize the public to war.

The direction he'll be taking the country is presciently illustrated by a column of blind classmates, conceived as a choral interlude, which references the famed parable of the blind leading the blind as well as John Singer Sargent's haunting war masterpiece "Gassed." Rarely has actuality footage been used so superbly, not merely for period flavor but as integral to the storyline: Once Mussolini renounces Ida, he's only seen as she sees him, through newsreels.

While the history is fascinating, it's the film's style that takes the breath away. Bellocchio sets up his scenes like acts from an opera, alternately theatrical, spectacular, intimate and resounding. Blasts of oratorio, insistent texts overlaid on images, even thunder and lightning become tools containing all the "unnatural" excesses of opera: The full import is conveyed as rightfully larger-than-life.

Both Mezzogiorno and Timi are perfectly cast. He's got Il Duce's grandstanding down pat, yet Timi's Mussolini is also frighteningly human. Mezzogiorno, moving and pathetic, pairs him beautifully: Her Ida is cultivated (as opposed to Rachele's coarse peasant accent) and intelligent, a woman battered by her brush with unfettered power.

Carlo Crivelli's music is a tour-de-force -- it's been a long time since this kind of orchestration has been so well used. Sweeping and bold, it harks back to some of the grand compositions of Hollywood's golden age, yet there isn't a whiff of the old-fashioned in its power to thrill.
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Camera (color/B&W), Daniele Cipri; editor, Francesca Calvelli; music, Carlo Crivelli; production designer, Marco Dentici; costume designer, Sergio Ballo; sound (Dolby Digital), Gaetano Carito; assistant director, Francesca Romana Polic Greco; casting, Stefania De Santis. Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (competing), May 18, 2009. Running time: 129 MIN.

The Army of Crime
L'Armee du Crime (France)
By JORDAN MINTZER
A StudioCanal release of an Agat Films & Cie, StudioCanal, France 3 Cinema production, with participation of Canal Plus, CineCinema, France 3, L'Agence Nationale pour la Cohesion Sociale et L'Egalite des Chances -- L'ACSE -- Fonds Images de la Diversite, CNC. (International sales: StudioCanal, Paris.) Produced by Dominique Barneaud, Marc Bordure, Robert Guediguian. Directed by Robert Guediguian. Screenplay, Guediguian, Serge Le Peron, Gilles Taurand, based on an original idea by Peron.

With: Simon Abkarian, Virginie Ledoyen, Robinson Stevenin, Gregoire Leprince-Ringuet, Lola Naymark, Yann Tregouet, Ariane Ascaride, Jean-Pierre Darroussin, Ivan Franek, Adrien Jolivet.

Despite a title and subject similar to Jean-Pierre Melville's 1969 masterwork "The Army of Shadows," Gallic wartime fresco "The Army of Crime" is a less thrilling and more academic take on the doomed efforts of the French Resistance. Based on the actual plights of a WWII underground immigrant brigade, vet helmer Robert Guediguian's lengthy period yarn features a wide array of characters filmed with his habitual simpatico eye, but loses the dramatic thread in too many plots, too little action and not enough originality. Imposing "Army" should score local victories, but overseas campaigns will be limited to mere surgical strikes.

Widely popular in French WWII lore and previously tackled by the 1976 film "L'Affiche rouge," the FTP-MOI was a Parisian-based branch of the Resistance whose members were Communist immigrants hailing from all parts of Europe. When 10 of its top fighters were executed in early 1944, the Vichy regime plastered a now legendary red-colored poster around Paris that depicted the men as terrorists and bore the slogan "Liberators? The Liberation, by the Army of Crime."

Beginning with the group's final paddy wagon ride to the firing range and then cutting to two-plus hours of backstory, the script initially hops between the four protags until uniting them about halfway through. Although such a structure allows the filmmakers to painstakingly construct the trajectory of each character, it severely hinders the flow of the narrative and fails to make the ongoing threat of capture, torture and death seem either real or suspenseful.

The plot focuses primarily on the band's Armenian-born leader, Missak Manouchian (played by French-Armenian actor Simon Abkarian), who's first arrested and then released from prison while his fighting, charmer g.f. (Virginie Ledoyen) watches in disbelief: A seductive, soft-spoken poet with strong political convictions but little desire to draw blood, Missak soon takes up the reigns of a movement whose principal activities entail distributing pamphlets and slaying Nazis in the street.

He finds a pair of worthy acolytes in two young Jewish troublemakers, Marxist bomb-rigger Thomas (Gregory Leprince-Ringuet) and athletic sharpshooter Marcel (Robinson Stevenin). As their collected killings get increasingly gruesome, the SS-administered police begin to crack down on their network, using a local detective (played by Guediguian regular Jean-Pierre Darroussin) to snuff out those in charge.

Had the story concentrated merely on Missak and his two cohorts, it might have been engaging in the way of Melville's film, which limited the action to Lino Ventura's harrowing p.o.v. But its cumbersome attempt to follow 18 characters (including the three protags' different friends and family members) makes for too many minor plots, which are handled in quick succession with little cinematic intensity.

What Guediguian gets right is the eerie mood of Vichy-era France, where most of the population continued life as usual while their fellow countrymen were being shipped off to Auschwitz or burned alive at their local police station. Well-chosen exteriors, filmed in warm hues by Pierre Milon ("The Class"), make for an oddly tranquil atmosphere interrupted by sudden surges of violence, recalling moments from the director's Marseilles-set thrillers "The Town Is Quiet" and "Lady Jane."

Thesps are so many and so scattered that no performance is a standout, though Leprince-Ringuet ("Love Songs") gives his character some pizzazz.

Alexandre Desplat's intrusive score, plus a good deal of additional Bach and Mozart, winds up sucking the energy from certain pivotal scenes.
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Camera (color), Pierre Milon; editor, Bernard Sasia; music, Alexandre Desplat; production designer, Michel Vandestien; costume designer, Christel Birot; sound (Dolby Digital/DTS Digital), Laurent Lafran, Gerard Lamps; assistant director, Gerard David; casting, Jacqueline Vicaire, Gaelle Baud, Sophie Hansen. Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (noncompeting), May 18, 2009. Running time: 138 MIN.

Tales From The Golden Age (Amintiri Din Epoca De Aur)
19 May, 2009 | By Mike Goodridge

Dirs: Cristian Mungiu, Ioana Maria Uricaru, Hanno Hofer, Razvan Marculescu, Constantin Popescu. Romania, 2009, 134 mins (varied)


A multi-episode portmanteau comically unseating the propagandist myth that Ceausescu's Romania was the "golden age" of communism, Tales From The Golden Age is another notch in the country's film-making renaissance which focuses on day-to-day life under the dictatorship to warm and often hilarious effect. Written by Palme d'Or winner Cristian Mungiu, who also directed one of the segments, it will be a crowd pleasing festival title around the world and could well stir up strong theatrical business in all the former Soviet nations.

International sales have already been plentiful – IFC prebought the US before Cannes – although its prospects in western arthouse markets may be hampered by the portmanteau form itself, an often unpopular style of cinema which rarely connects with audiences.

The version of the film which first screened in Cannes had only five episodes. A third and final screening on Wednesday 20 May will include Mungiu's second directorial episode, bringing the total running time to 155 minutes. In Romania, the film will be released in two parts – four episodes as Tales Of Authority and two as Tales Of Love. The press notes call it a "film with variable geometry" designed to reflect the fact that Romanian audiences under Ceausescu never knew what to expect when they went to the cinema. Likewise, it was made as a collaborative effort and the individual director of each episode is not identified.

As a portmanteau, it is more coherent than most (ParisI Love You, Eros, Tokyo!, Triangle, Three Extremes) which are often hit and miss. Not only are the five films here consistently strong but the cumulative effect is to offer a surreal portrait of life in Romania in the 1980s where undertones of fear, corruption and imprisonment are never far away from the laughter and spirit which kept the people afloat.

Mungiu's already significant name and the fact that the film actually generates plentiful laughs will strengthen Tales' profile in the marketplace. And naysayers who believe that it won't find an audience need only be reminded that Four Months took over $10m in worldwide grosses, extraordinary results for such a bleak movie.

The central concept here is to take the most well-known urban legends of the period and tell stories to illustrate them.

First film The Legend Of The Official Visit follows a town preparing for an official state visit as the townspeople faithfully obey every whimsical request of the organising committee. The shortest and probably the best of the five films, it's a wonderfully absurdist portrait of how normal rural folk were forced to behave when officials came to town. When the Party Inspector (Pirvu) gets a phone call saying that the visit has been cancelled, they all get drunk and mount a carousel at a nearby fair.  Unfortunately nobody is left on the ground to switch it off and they spin around all through the night.

Second film The Legend Of The Party Photographer continues the light-hearted vein as the state photographer (Birau) is instructed to touch up some photographs taken on the official state visit of France's President Giscard d'Estang to Bucharest. The Frenchman appears taller than Ceausescu in the photographs, so he is instructed to put a hat on him to make their heights more level.

The ensuing debacle led to the only day in its history that the party paper Scienteia was not published.

The third episode The Legend Of The Chicken Driver is a more sombre affair, showing how hard it was to come by food in Romania in the "golden age". Four Months abortionist Ivanov plays the driver of a chicken transport truck who is forbidden to stop on the way to his drop-off point until the night his wheels are stolen and he is forced to go to an inn run by a beautiful woman.

The fourth segment The Legend Of The Greedy Policeman, which will probably become the film's most celebrated entry, illustrates how good food was used as currency among adults and children alike. When a country relative brings a live pig to a policeman and his family in the city, the family is faced with the dilemma of how to kill the pig. They opt to trap it in the kitchen and gas it, with catastrophic results.

The final segment The Legend Of The Air Sellers, which looks at attempts at private enterprise, also contains some laugh-out- loud moments as a young woman (Cavalioti) and man (Iacoban) plan an elaborate con on various apartment blocks to make money by selling empty bottles.

Bookended by Communist anthems and with its credits featuring footage of various party rallies, Tales film doesn't feel the need to criticise the lunacy of the regime, but it finds plenty of mileage in its affectionate look at the men, women and children who had to survive it.

Ghosts of the Heartland
By RONNIE SCHEIB

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An ABL Communications production. Produced, directed, written by Allen Blumberg.

With: Phil Moon, Michael Santoro, Rosanne Ma, David Midthunder, Marcus Ho, William Kozy, Michelle Peters, James Saito, Karen Tsen Lee, Jeff Jerome, Bill Cain, Kelly Aucoin.

In tyro helmer-scribe Allen Blumberg's dynamic black-and-white political thriller, "Ghosts of the Heartland," set at the height of McCarthyism, racism, corruption and paranoia run rampant through 1952 small-town America. Unlike the sleek, high-contrast B&W look of arty period reconstructions like "Good Night, and Good Luck," Blumberg opts for a sleazy, fleshy immediacy reminiscent of Sam Fuller. Although nervy and fluid during action scenes, the pic bogs down elsewhere, mainly due to its wooden lead thesp. Opening May 22 at Gotham's Quad, "Ghosts" will fade quickly, but nonetheless reps a kinetic take on a little-explored period with an intriguing ethnic twist.

Chinese-American reporter Roland Lu (Phil Moon) returns from the big city to his hometown in search of the story that will win him the Pulitzer Prize. Millville has changed in his absence. The town's corrupt mayor, Frank Dugan (Michael Santoro), who also runs the local newspaper, has used the Korean War to stir up hatred against the indigenous Chinese population and drive them out of their jobs.

Roland digs up dirt on a secret land-grabbing conspiracy that evicted local Indians 20 years previously. He exploits this past scandal to thwart an ingenious new plan to dispossess the Chinese, joining forces with a barmaid, a closeted gay and an Indian in full tribal regalia. Dugan, threatened with exposure, moves to wipe out the evidence in well-staged, violent action scenes.

Santoro's villainous Dugan commands the screen, a fascinating power-driven blend of populism, bigotry and self-interest. If the rest of the cast registered as compellingly as Santoro, what reads as a half-didactic study of racism would come alive as a shadowy ambivalent exploration of ethnic, professional and sexual identity in Blumberg's blunt but forceful script.

Scenes between Dugan and his secret Chinese squeeze (Karen Tsen Lee) come off as fully engaged, well acted noir setpieces, in marked contrast with the bland exchanges between the square-jawed hero and g.f. Liz (Rosanne Ma).

Still, as characters move stealthily through dark alleys, run each other down on deserted streets, strangle repentant cohorts or bleed from tomahawk wounds, the pic intermittently attests to the power of genre to embody matters of consequence.
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Camera (B&W), Antoine Vivas Denisov; editor, Emily Paine; music, Tom Hiel; production designer, Roshelle Bernliner; costume designer, Michael Bevins; sound, William Kozy, Christopher Gebert; supervising sound editor, Harry Beck Bolles. Reviewed at Quad Cinema, New York, May 15, 2009. Running time: 80 MIN.

Daniel & Ana
(Mexico)
By LESLIE FELPERIN
An Alameda Films presentation, in association with Fidecine, Labofilms, Labodigital, Pop Films, Strawberry Films, Blufilms, Morena Films. (International sales: Fortissimo Films, Amsterdam.) Produced by Daniel Birman Ripstein. Co-producers, Michel Franco, Enrique Aagon, Adolfo Alagon, Guillermo Alagon, Alvaro Longoria. Directed, written by Michel Franco.

With: Dario Yazbek Bernal, Marimar Vega, Chema Torre, Jose Maria Torre, Montserrat Ontiveros, Luis Miguel Lombana.

A horrible kidnapping shatters the lives of a brother and sister in austere, controlled Mexican drama "Daniel & Ana," the feature debut for Mexican shorts and commercials helmer Michel Franco. Adopting a show-don't-tell approach to narrative, the screenplay leaves it to the audience to map the psychological terrain, which will frustrate some but thrill others who prefer oblique storytelling. Nevertheless, without full critical support, the pic will struggle to expand beyond the fest circuit, though the presence in the title role of Dario Yazbek Bernal, brother of thesp Gael Garcia Bernal, could pique buyer and aud interest.

Attractive, outgoing college girl Ana Torres (Marimar Vega), the daughter of a wealthy, closeknit Mexico City family, is planning to get married to stolid Rafael (Jose Maria Torre) in three months. While Ana is out shopping with her shy but good-natured 16-year-old brother Daniel (Dario Yazbek Bernal), the two of them are kidnapped by a gang. The sequence proves striking: It unfolds quietly, with no shouting or fuss, creating maximal realism but dread all the same.

The kidnappers are not after money. Instead, they force Ana and Daniel to have sex on camera, threatening to kill them if they don't comply. If that seems farfetched, the opening subtitles assert the entire narrative is based on a true story. Meanwhile, concluding subtitles explain there's a known subculture of pornography made under such coercive conditions.

The kidnapping happens just 20 minutes into the film. Remainder of the pic's running time is concerned with the aftermath, as each sibling deals with the trauma in a very different way.

Telling no one about what happened, not even their parents, until Ana finally goes to see a shrink, both withdraw from human contact. Daniel, who's actually the more disturbed of the two, can seemingly hide behind people's assumptions that he's just being a surly teenager.

Last act introduces a real shocker, after which tension ratchets right up, based on expectations that anything could happen given the unpredictability of human nature. The suspense is all the greater since helmer Franco avoids any dramatic, nonsource music, and in collaboration with lenser Chuy Chavez ("Chuck and Buck," "Me and You and Everyone We Know"), keeps the camera at a cool distance from the thesps most of the time.

Leads Vega and Bernal hold up their end impressively, enhancing the pic's naturalism with muted, naturalistic perfs that hinge of the subtlest of changes of expression. Both ought to experience major career boosts.

Rest of the tech package is good, on par for the low-budget course.

Camera (color), Chuy Chavez; editor, Oscar Figueroa; production designer, Martha Papadimitriou; costume designer, Josefina Echeverria; sound (Dolby Digital), Santiago Nunez, Carlos Aguliar. Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (Directors' Fortnight), May 18, 2009. Running time: 85 MIN.

Dogtooth
Kynodontas (Greece)
By BOYD VAN HOEIJ
A Boo Prods. production, in association with Greek Film Center, Yorgos Lanthimos, Horsefly. (International sales: MK2, Paris.) Produced by Yorgos Tsourgiannis. Executive producer, Iraklis Mavroidis. Directed by Yorgos Lanthimos. Screenplay, Lanthimos, Efthimis Filippou.

With: Christos Stergioglou, Michele Valley, Aggeliki Papoulia, Christos Passalis, Mary Tsoni, Anna Kalaitzidou.

Three indefinitely grounded siblings are stuck in an alternative universe dictated by their parents' cruel whimsies -- think an eternal "Big Brother" house as designed by Lars von Trier -- in Yorgos Lanthimos' "Dogtooth." Though at first nothing much happens and even less is explained, the Greek helmer's sophomore pic does exude a strange fascination throughout. A clearly present and utterly devious sense of humor might help it get some high-end commercial engagements in Euro burgs, though its natural place is at fests that embrace a take-it-or-leave-it approach to programming.

The nameless family's son (Christos Passalis) and his two younger sisters (Aggeliki Papoulia, Mary Tsoni) are -- not all that blissfully -- unaware of what happens in the outside world. Their father (Christos Stergioglou), who works at a factory, is the only one allowed to leave the isolated family abode, which is surrounded by a very high fence. Besides a hidden phone only the mother (Michele Valley) uses, there are no means of communication available.

The kids, who seem to be in their late teens or early 20s, spend their days learning useless things from cassette tapes ("a 'carbine' is a beautiful white bird") or devising their own weird little games ("I've got a new anesthetic, want to try?"). They are bullied into submission by the strict rules imposed on them by their parents, who often literally make them act like dogs.

The siblings' entire worldview is dictated by the often false or misleading information they receive, and some auds will no doubt spy a biting critique of parental irresponsibility and homeschooling, arguing for the importance of social interaction for the proper development of children. But helmer Lanthimos ("Kinetta") leaves the reasons behind the parents' dictatorial behavior up in the air.

Things really go haywire when the only allowed visitor from the outside world, Christina (Anna Kalaitzidou), is brought in again to have sex with the son. She exchanges some goods from the outside world with the sisters, which sets off a chain of events that quickly turns violent.

Ace editor Yorgos Mavropsaridis strings together the material in a way that suggests these snippets of the kids' lives are part of a cyclical, neverending story of boredom, half-truths and disturbing behavior. The ingeniously constructed screenplay also shows how wrong or irrational teachings can quickly spiral out of control, with increasingly disturbing humor used at first to leaven the proceedings before making auds laugh at the painfully logical conclusions to all the preceding lies.

Clear tension between the secluded home and the vast outside world strongly recalls Andrew Wyeth's painting "Christina's World," and pic's consistently troubling atmosphere is what keeps audiences hooked.

Visually, "Dogtooth" is more akin to David Hockney's brightly lit and unnaturally calm views of pools and villas. Like last year's Swedish Cannes title "Involuntary," lensing consists mostly of fixed camera shots that rarely show the characters in their entirety, mirroring their cut-off location and distorted worldview. Two brief erect-penis shots guarantee pic's arthouse cred.
More than one option



Camera (color, widescreen), Thimios Bakatakis; editor, Yorgos Mavropsaridis; art director, Elli Papageorgakopoulou; costume designer, Papageorgakopoulou; sound (Dolby Digital), Leandros Ntounis; associate producer Athina Tsangari. Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (Un Certain Regard), May 18, 2009. Running time: 94 MIN.

Focus Features International has virtually sold out the world on Kevin Macdonald's upcoming Roman Britain epic Eagle Of The Ninth, which is set to begin shooting later this summer with Channing Tatum and Jamie Bell.


Rights have gone to: the UK (Entertainment); France (Metropolitan); Germany (Telemunchen); Italy (Bim); Scandinavia (Nordisk); Benelux (RCV); South Korea: (Ssamzie); Greece (Odeon); Israel (Shani); Portugal (Castello Lopes); and the Middle East (Italia).

Deals also closed in: India (PVR); Indonesia (Queen); Singapore (Shaw); Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania

(Prorom); the Czech Republic (Hollywood Classics); former Yugoslavia (Discovery); and Poland (Monolith).

President of sales and distribution Alison Thompson said she was also in the process of closing deals with SouthAfrica, Thailand, Taiwan, the Philippines, Malaysia, Hong Kong and Turkey. Focus holds North American rights.

Jeremy Brock adapted the screenplay from Rosemary Sutcliff's novel of the same name and previously collaborated with Macdonald on The Last King Of Scotland.

Duncan Kenworthy is producing and Focus' senior vice-president of European production Teresa Moneo, who brought the project to the company, is supervising production.

Drag Me to Hell
By PETER DEBRUGE
A Universal release of a Ghost House Pictures presentation. Produced by Rob Tapert, Grant Curtis. Executive producers, Joe Drake, Nathan Kahane. Co-producers, Cristen Carr Strubbe, Ivan Raimi. Directed by Sam Raimi. Screenplay, Raimi, Ivan Raimi.

Christine Brown - .. Alison Lohman
Clay Dalton - Justin Long
Mrs. Ganush - Lorna Raver
Rham Jas - Dileep Rao
Mr. Jacks - David Paymer
Shaun San Dena - Adriana Barraza
Leonard Dalton - Chelcie Ross
Stu Rubin - Reggie Lee

Sam Raimi returns to his roots in "Drag Me to Hell," a flagrantly schlocky horror yarn that will titillate the teens without alienating the director's far pickier fanboy contingent, who will find the "Evil Dead"-style action they've been clamoring for in a surprisingly potent PG-13 package. When the bank forecloses on an old gypsy's house, it's the unlucky young loan officer who risks having her soul repossessed in this throwback to both Raimi's early work and '50s B-movies. After booking the pic in coveted midnight slots at the SXSW and Cannes fests, Universal should see strong awareness yield heavenly returns.

As its no-nonsense title suggests, "Drag Me to Hell" offers a kicking-and-screaming riff on the classic curse movie -- and if the material scarcely warrants feature length, so be it. Scant of plot and barren of subtext, the pic is single-mindedly devoted to pushing the audience's buttons, and who better than Raimi to do the honors? Long before he went legit with "A Simple Plan," helmer was perfecting inventive shocks on shoestring budgets, and, as if to remind us of that legacy, he opens this modestly budgeted film (by "Spider-Man" standards, at least) with an early-'80s Universal logo.

First scene further cements the tone, as an innocent boy (though not so innocent as to avoid being cursed) attempts to outrun his imminent damnation, only to be thrown from a balcony and swallowed whole by a gaping, fiery chasm in the earth. It's hard to imagine such a fate awaiting Christine (Alison Lohman), a sweet young lady gunning for the assistant manager job at her local bank, until we see the almost comically unkempt old hag who comes begging for an extension on her mortgage.

With one bad eye, gnarled fingernails and inexplicably jagged dentures, Mrs. Ganush (Lorna Raver) is clearly the reason Raimi and his brother Ivan decided to write this in the first place. She's as memorable a villain as Christine is forgettable a heroine, and the fact that Mrs. Ganush means bad business is so evident in her introductory scene that the mere appearance of her car (played by Raimi's own instantly recognizable 1973 Oldsmobile) in the parking garage is enough to make neck hairs stand on end.

On the losing end of a showdown that makes creative use of a stapler and several other everyday office supplies, Mrs. Ganush manages to grab one of Christine's buttons and utter a nasty incantation. "Soon it will be you who comes begging to me," she predicts. But the crusty old crone expires before Christine can ask her to lift the curse, leaving our hell-bent heroine with no one but her skeptical fiance (Justin Long) and an in-over-his-head street-corner psychic (Dileep Rao) to advise her on how to escape her fate.

In the increasingly desperate events that follow, Raimi clearly believes the mouth, not the eyes, are the window to the soul, with one grossout gag after another exploiting auds' fear of foreign substances (from ominous flies to Mrs. Ganush's phlegm) entering the mouth. Such off-putting visuals are considerably more effective than Raimi's next favorite trick, which is to ratchet up the already overloud soundtrack alongside a shock cut.

The scares are all delivered in Raimi's usual tongue-in-cheek style, down to the menacing goat-like "Lamia" (seen only in cartoonish silhouette, its shape is a direct homage to Jacques Tourneur's 1957 "Night of the Demon"). It's odd to find so many laugh-out-loud moments amid such genuine tension, but were it not for Raimi's comic touch, auds would likely be outraged by a good deal of the material -- the fate of Christine's kitten, for instance, or the movie's unapologetically backward characterization of gypsies.

Pic seems to have lucked into what little relevance the mortgage crisis lends its story, otherwise so slight as to seem better suited to an hourlong "Masters of Horror" episode. Still, there's no denying it delivers far more than competing PG-13 thrillers (including several from Raimi's own Ghost House shingle).

CG touches -- including the one that'll have auds cheering into the end credits -- look cheap, but practical effects and makeup are tops.

wow...

Jodorowsky. Lynch. Zsigmond. Nolte. Manson. Argento. Kier. Fuck. Yes.

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/41161

lepo je to sve, al koja je to jebena VEST, kad svi podaci iz nje, uključujući vilmoša, figuriraju na imdb-u već neko vreme; baš sam pre par nedelja četovao na FB-u s janjetovim koji mi je skrenuo pažnju na neke momente vezane za film, i sve ovo što se ovde lupa u bubnjeve kao otkriće bilo je na imdb-u još tada.

po janjetovu, film bi trebalo da se snima u španiji ovog leta.

inače, ne sviđa mi se ova vest da je azija trudna i da neće da snima film zbog toga. nadajmo se da je to patka, ili da će da ga abortira kako bi igrala kod joda.
ipak, jodo snima 1 film u 15 godina, a ona dete može da rađa i dogodine ako joj je baš do žgepčeta!

Cantona to star in film 'Moves'
Film to be directed by Herve P. Gustave
By JOHN HOPEWELL
Soccer-star-turned actor Eric Cantona will be in HPG's next film, 'Les mouvements du bassin' (The Pelvis Moves).


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CANNES — Rolling off his success in Ken Loach's "Looking for Eric," soccer-star-turned thesp Eric Cantona will topline "Les mouvements du bassin" (The Pelvis Moves), the next film from Gallic helmer HPG, the screen name of director-thesp Herve P. Gustave.
The HPG directed and starrer "On ne devrait pas existir" (We Should Not Exist) played in Cannes 2006 Directors' Fortnight.

Described as a burlesque tragic actioner, "Moves" turns on the relationship between two outsiders, Thierry, a student of self-defense martial arts, and Marion, whose dream is to have a child.

Cantona plays Thierry. Rachida Brackni, his real-life wife who acted in "Exist," limns Marion.

Currently in pre-production, "Moves" is set up at France's Capricci Films, a boutique production-distribution-sales company and book publisher based out of Nantes. "Moves" is skedded to shoot this fall, said Capricci partner Thierry Lounas.

Capricci will also produce "Dracula," the next film by left-of-field Catalan director Albert Serra, whose "Honor of the Knights" and "Birdsong" played Directors' Fortnight in 2006 and 2008 respectively.

Like "Honor," a hyper-minimalist, painterly rendering of two episodes from the "Quixote," "Dracula" looks set to deliver a singular big-screen version of Bram Stoker's novel.

In development, and to shoot in Romania and France, pic will use non-professional actors and a provisional screenplay allowing for on-set innovation.

Capricci will co-produce with Serra's own Barcelona label, Andergraun Films, pic's lead producer. As on "Birdsong," Capricci will also take French distribution and international sales rights, Lounas said.

Angry Badger Pictures has signed "Trainspotting" author Irvine Welsh to direct its soccer comedy "The Magnificent Eleven."
Welsh will work with the father-son writing team Pete and John Adams on the next draft of the screenplay. He wrote "Trainspotting" as his first novel and recently co-wrote and directed "Good Arrows" through his Dust production banner.

"The Magnificent Eleven" is scheduled to shoot later this year. It's a modernization of the "The Magnificent Seven" centered on a local amateur soccer team, a Tandoori restaurant and a group of menacing thugs.

Angry Badger, led by John and Pete Adams, most recently completed action horror feature "S.N.U.B!"

Sto mu gromova! Sad vidjeh na IMDb-u, Džon Burman radi Čarobnjaka iz Oza! 
To će da bude sjajno, sigurno će strašilo da povali Doroti i ko zna šta će još da se izdešava!

New World Order
(Documentary)
By RONNIE SCHEIB

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An IFC presentation of a SeeThink production in association with Cactus Three Films. Produced by Tom Davis. Executive producers, Julie Goldman, Krysanne Katsoolis, Caroline Stevens, Debbie DeMontreaux, Christine Lubrano, Evan Shapiro.
Directed by Luke Meyer, Andrew Neel.

With: Alex Jones, Luke Rudowski, Jack McLamb, Jim Tucker, Timucin Leflef, Geraldo Rivera.

At a Ground Zero anniversary memorial, conspiracy theorists argue 9/11 was "an inside job," while at Chantilly, Va., they monitor arrivals of the super-rich members of the hush-hush Bilderberg group. Luke Meyer and Andrew Neel's "New World Order" is less about an international cabal seeking world enslavement than about those who fervently believe such conspiracies exist and who crusade to defeat them. As in their previous docu "Darkon," about medieval game-players, the filmmakers here neither validate nor ridicule their subjects. Opening May 22 at Gotham's Cinema Village prior to an IFC airing, the docu's very sanity may limit its appeal.

Austin radio host-cum-video pamphleteer Alex Jones is the group's most successfully self-promotional. Jones theatricalizes his paranoid fantasies for any camera or mic in sight, while retired cop-turned-militiaman Jack McLamb covertly dwells with like-minded Christians on an Idaho mountaintop, and twentysomething Brooklynite Luke Rudowski quietly dedicates each spare moment to awakening others to their imminent imperilment. Stressing extremist scenarios, proselytizers exclude partial meetings of the minds. Some minds, of course, are already shut down -- witness Geraldo Rivera's scathing contempt when the demonstrators interrupt his Times Square broadcast about underclad coeds.


Camera (color, HD), Meyer, Neel; editor, Nathan Caswell; music, Jonn Ollsin, Jonah Rapino. Reviewed on DVD, New York, May 16, 2009. (In SXSW Film Festival.) Running time: 86 MIN.