the most anticipated...

[crippled_avenger]

British director Paul Greengrass can effortlessly go from political dramas such as Bloody Sunday to commercial thrillers such as the last two Bourne films, and in between with United 93. His latest film, The Bourne Ultimatum, seems the perfect post-9/11 film, given what is happening in contemporary America, but ask the director about the film's politics and he won't have a bar of it, as PAUL FISCHER discovered.

Question: How important was it for you stepping into Ultimatum to ensure that this was as politically relevant as you could make it given the fact you'd done United 93 and we are living in this post 9-11 world, eavesdropping and lack of privacy, etc. Was it important for you to ensure collected all those concerns I'm sure you must have had?

Greengrass: You know the thing is when you come to a Bourne movie you come to have some fun. That's honestly the truth of it, I mean me personally. It's a Saturday night movie. It's the movie I'd go to if I were going out for a Saturday night and I'd want to have a great time and have the best ride of the summer. I'm answering your question. I'm not being facetious, I'm being honest here. That, front and center, is what a Bourne movie is going to be. It's gotta be true to the character and true to the world the character lives in. Now, the Bourne world is the world that's outside our door. If you opened your door in New York or Paris or London or whatever you got to believe that whatever story it is that Bourne's engaged in could be happening there. But I don't come to a Bourne movie to make any kind of statement. What attracts me to Bourne's world is that is a real world and I think I'm most comfortable there. But I come to a Bourne movie to have fun as a filmmaker, to strut my stuff and that's part of the fun of franchise filmmaking. You get to build a ride and bring it out in the summer and compete with all the other great movies out in the marketplace. So yeah, there is an awful lot 'cos we've all made...a lot of people come back... they were there for Supremacy and you're kind of feeling around the set is that we're going to be the best. You've got to believe that. It's quite sporting in a way. For me it kind of feels like we're going to win. When you're directing a franchise movie you want to foster that because you know they're very, very arduous long tiring complex frustrating sometimes activities. But you must never lose the sense of adventure. You know, the sense of excitement. Now what makes Bourne special I think is that it marries that with intelligence, with cool story telling, doesn't underestimate its audience and it's got this kind of gritty real contemporary landscape. That to me to answer your question is that's the dash of Worcester sauce. That's the little bit of chili but it's not the meal. That's what I think about it. When I go off and do my movies, I'll make the chili the whole meal.

Question: Paul, you take the viewer that's watching this movie on a very exciting and visual journey and I'm just curious because of the various locations you went in, what were some of the challenges in many of the cities that you happened to run up against if any?

Greengrass: Every one of them was a hideous nightmare. That's the truth of it. But one of the things that I like to say when I'm making a film--it's a bit of a mantra for me is whatever our problem is is our opportunity. It's certainly true in a Bourne movie. One of the things that makes the Bourne movies so exciting I think is you do get to go on a journey. Generally through the franchise that journey is in Europe. This time obviously towards the end it comes back to New York. Unlike a lot of films if we're in Tangier, we're in Tangier. We're not on the backlot somewhere. That makes for tremendous logistical difficulties and tremendous difficulties in shooting. If you're going to say let's mount really a very large sequence on Waterloo Station. That's the busiest terminal in London, you know. Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people are going through that place every hour. You can't lock it down. They wouldn't let you and you can't do it, so what you have to do is see that as an opportunity not a problem. What you get is the texture of life within it and all the things I believe very, very much as a filmmaker is that if you create a film set which is the classic way it's done which is highly sanitized, you know. There's a perimeter around it and you know, you effectively erect a wall around yourself and then you've got a sanitized space where you can make your movie inside that. That's fine but I think the problem is you become cut off from the real world, so I like to have a set that has what's going on, you know. It makes for problems, but what you get in return for that is the vibrancy, the energy of a huge mainline station or Tangier or New York and it shows. Its part of what makes the Bourne films special, I think.

Question: How did you shoot that in Waterloo?

Greengrass: With enormous difficulty! You have to think carefully about how you're going to do it. What you do is you design the sequence that is in many, many pieces so in fact you're planning to shoot in many different parts of the station. What you have to do is never be in the same place twice because what happens is that people get to know you're there and a crowd starts to build up. What you have to do be like a...it's impossible to be like a true guerilla unit because it's a huge...it's a Bourne movie...it's a huge movie, but you've got to move from place to place and be unpredictable so people don't know where you are and then move on fast. You've got to schedule it so you're not there for too long a period of time in any one time. So you might go for 2-3 days and then disappear and go off and do something else and then come back for 2-3 days a week or two later. If people get to know you're going to be there, then the crowds are going to build up and what it means, of course, it puts prodigious demands on the actors because they never know from one hour to the next which bit of the sequence... well even I didn't know... you've just got to seize your moment. It makes for opportunity. I think that my films--I'm not doing across the board here-- but it's certainly true of Bourne Ultimatum--you're trying to bring together two forces that essentially are going in opposite directions. And those 2 forces are structure, order, planning, story, all the things you can lay down in advance logistically, narratively whatever it is. Then you've got the force of freedom, improvisation, the moment, the happy accident, the unstructured bit of filmmaking. I think what I try to do all the time is bring those two into the closed possible proximity and where the two meet that's where a Bourne movie should be. It means that they're fresh, you know. A Bourne movie is not an airline meal. It's made on the run, you know. It doesn't always work believe me but you know. With this tremendous self belief in the team, we've got in my view the greatest movie star in the world. He's perfect for the part. Fantastic producers in the studio who allow us to make this huge franchise movie in this incredibly edgy, bold way actually, and together as a team we get there, I hope.

Question: Looking at the production notes before you started, I was glancing through them and I noticed there was a page of stunt performers. Now when you craft your scene do you do the stunt aspect first or do you do the script and then kind of work the stunt in and a comment to add to that the fight scene in Tangiers was the most exhausting, exhilarating scene I've ever seen. I thought will someone just die. It was just on the edge of everything so I just had to tell you that.

Greengrass: Well, the answer is that you...how do you design a big action sequence? First of all you have to attach it initially in its broadest sense. It's just my view. I think it's tremendously important when you're looking at action in a movie and I think it's one of the reasons why Bourne films people love them, you've got to pay very close attention to how it's set up. You've got to have a real reason for your character to move into action as opposed to oh, let's just have an action sequence. So how you set up the narrative and the issues that are in play that demand the central character to go into action are very, very important and you have to choreograph that carefully and if you do it carefully and satisfactorily by the time you hit the action your audience is loving it because they've been primed to go. Then you've got to conceive of action in an original way that is consistent with Bourne and his world. That means that when Bourne is in a corner you can't just have him, you know, pull out some kind of technology and get himself out of trouble or suddenly have some kind of magic powers that get him out of hole or he's a superhero so he can just swat them aside. You've got to think through the thought process of a real man absorbing information at high speed, making a choice and then executing it with pace and precision. When you're making the film, that's what you've got to show all the time every time. You see that throughout all those action sequences and then the last fact you've got to pay very close attention to I think and I've tried to do it in the two I've done is that whenever you go into action, the action has got to lead to character development. The character has got to be changed during the course of the action. It's got to be selling your something profound about the character as opposed to it just happening. So if you think of that whole Tangiers sequence that's you know, it resolves itself with a core character moment of shame about Bourne, he's right there and he's had to kill again and all of that. So when you marry those three things together then I think you get satisfying action. To answer the question about what was the question--about the fight? The fight is essentially a violent ballet. That's what it is in reality. What you're looking to do is... first you have to commit to the actors doing it, not the stunt men. That's number 1. Stunt men may help enormously and always do in preparation of the fight. When you prepare a fight you go into a rehearsal room and they'll be stunt performers and you start to work out with stunt performers to begin with how and the actors how the fight might unfold. You can't be exploring dangerous elements with your leader. Then as you get the shape the actors will come in and we'll start to build it up and change it and evolve it and they let their own ideas in. Then you start to work on the precision and the pace of it. It's a tremendous amount of work that goes into these things before they ever hit the floor. Then once you're on the floor, the moves, the dance is set. It's a dance, that's what it is. Then what you're working on is if the tolerance is that between safe and somebody getting knocked out for 6 years then you're looking to get that tolerance to there.

Question: And you nailed it.

Greengrass: I didn't, they did. And that takes, believe me, unbelievable stamina for those two actors, day after day after day. Incredible exertions of power, courage--because you're getting hurt in those things. You can't smash around like that for a week or whatever it is in confined spaces really...when you're in front of it it's absolutely ferocious. It's like they're fighting. They are fighting. And then the last thing you need is an incredible trust that's earned from rehearsals. Trust that when that guy throws that punch it's going to be real and he's got to trust that the other guy is just going to be that far away and you've got to decide who's in charge of the moves because you both can't be in charge. It's like ...incredible. Very exciting to watch if you're a director.

Question: Was there any debate whether or not to keep the ending a bit more ambiguous rather than to show Bourne swimming away? Was there ever a moment where you felt you should leave it hanging just a little bit?

Greengrass: Not really to be honest. Not at all in fact to be absolutely honest. I'm always a very, very strong proponent myself of Bourne standing clear and unbroken at the end. I think it's ...but that's because Bourne is a very moral character at heart. He never expresses any moralizing but he's essentially a character--that's why we love him because he's got a dark past and he's renounced it and he's trying to make like a new chapter for himself. He's seeking the light, always. Also he's an outlaw. He's us against them and they're never going to catch him, so I never want Bourne to be caught. That's something I always want to believe that he's out there, because he's the person who says I won't get fooled again. Where's the answers? You're lying to me. I just love that about the character.

Question: Paul, how has Matt Damon changed working with him over the course, he's said it's been 7 years. 5 years worth of movies doing this kind of incredible adventure--this trilogy and secondly I couldn't help but think as I watched David Strathairn through the movie I kept chanting Cheney, Cheney, Cheney. He seems to epitomize the government guy who is convinced that he's right and does everything wrong and only has a belief in himself. How conscious were you of making that kind of political statement in this movie?

Greengrass: Honestly and truly I'm not ducking it not at all. I mean it's like...I don't think he actually looks like Dick Cheney does he? No, it never occurred...better hair right. No, I mean it's a Bourne movie it's not a private political soap box for me or anybody else. I'm not ducking it; it's honestly how I feel. But as a franchise it's aggressively contemporary and that's part of its appeal. It's not topical though, and there is a difference between contemporary which is good in a Bourne movie and topical which would be Dick Cheney which would not be good because I wouldn't want to go out on a Saturday night and see Dick Cheney in a movie. That's the truth of it you know.

Question: Audiences at screenings cheer when the CIA gets its ass kicked repeatedly. Were they cheering because they knew they were the bad guys or because it was the CIA?

Greengrass: We're all engaged in the world. That's why the Bourne franchise works because you go on a Saturday night or whenever you go but it's an action adventure but the character has real heart and soul and a real moral component existing in the real world. He makes choices about the world. When he says I'm no longer Jason Bourne and renounces all the black ops that have scarred his life effectively for 7 years of course that has power, but I think it feels earned by the film. I think it feels earned in particular by the franchise, by the 3 films which goes to your 1st question which is how Matt's changed. I think one of the things that's most interesting to me and I really look forward and this is a funny thing to say but the last time I watched this film is when it comes out on DVD I'm going to sit and watch Identity, Supremacy and Ultimatum back to back and that will be it--done for it. I know what I'll see. I'll see he's my friend, Matt, and I love him but I'll see a wonderful, wonderful actor going through 7 years of his life. Bourne aging and being tempered by his journey through the dark paranoid conspiratorial Bourne world and that I think is part of what I think why Ultimatum seems to work. It's very hard when you make a film and you hope it works and you dream it works and you work your butt off to try to make it work but you never know. You'd have a much better sense of the film than I would at this point but I think one of the things that always did feel very powerful to me making it was this sense of Matt tempered. He's 7 years older than he was when he was in Bourne and the character of Bourne knows so much more now than Jason Bourne did when he was fished out of the water at the start of Identity who knew nothing. He didn't even know what his name was. He didn't even know he'd been in the CIA, now he's gone through 2 movies and the character you find in Ultimatum is still in the ...he still has the full range of his skills. He's down the road towards finding the answers to his quest but he knows he faces formidable adversaries who will probably never be beaten. Somewhere Matt manages to convey that and it crackles with contemporariness there. I think we all...and that goes to the Cheney thing, I don't think it's about Cheney or any one government or anything like that. I think there's something about a character facing the huge problems and challenges of the contemporary world and meeting them with head on with courage, allowing for darkness and mistake, but ultimately always moral. That's incredibly, incredibly inspiring and that's honestly what I think. That to me is what it's about and I think that's why you enjoy the ride and that's why I think people love the character because it speaks to them but not in a partisan way. It just speaks to the way the world is. It's full of difficulty and challenge and violence and ultimately if you can keep struggling toward the light you find the road.

Question: How much authorship do you feel for these films? You didn't do the 1st one but your style is so identified with the whole series just from the last one.

Greengrass: How much sense of authorship? Well, I'm not ducking it but the truth is I'll duck it. No, franchise filmmaking is a group activity. It really is. The scale of the activity is huge; both logistical, financial, budgetary, resource wise it's just you operate 360 degrees in a cruel time frame to make these things happen. No one person is the author of a Bourne film. The truth is it's a coalition of people who share the same vision for Bourne and his world and we...its remarkably collaborative and collective. Oh listen we disagree and we have tremendous old cat fights about can't go this way, we should go this way and from time to time and somebody will have to judicate, whether it's me or whatever. But that's why they're so great because I've never had an argument in a Bourne film--ever. Like an argument, a bad...we've had you know, but never once. It's a fantastic...that's one of the reasons they work--a brilliant team effort.

Question: Paul, what did your Oscar nomination mean to you?

Greengrass: It was very nice. I was actually on the set of Bourne Ultimatum at that time and everybody was very nice. It meant a lot to me most of all because of the journey we took with all those families. They were so incredibly supportive of us and it meant the world to them and of course on a personal level it was a great honor, but it meant most because they felt acknowledged in this city, by Hollywood. And I think that was fantastic.

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Roger Avary is attached to write and direct an adaptation of the 2001 ID Software video game "Return to Castle Wolfenstein" reports Variety.

Producer Samuel Hadida, who worked with Avary on the script adaptation of "Silent Hill," is also producing this.

The original 'Return' game was a sequel to the 1992 "Wolfenstein 3D", the first popular game of the 'first person shooter' genre which now dominates all gaming.

In 'Return', U.S. Army Ranger B.J. Blazkowicz leads a team of agents into Castle Wolfenstein in order to investigate the Nazis' SS Paranormal Division.

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IESB.Net reports that "Underworld" and "Live Free or Die Hard" helmer Len Wiseman is currently in talks to develop and direct both "Gears of War" and "Escape from New York" for New Line Cinema.

Written by Stuart Beattie and slated for a 2009 release, "Gears of War" is an adaptation of last year's hit XBox 360 video game about soldiers on an alien planet fighting hordes of creatures.

Also slated for 2009 is the Ken Nolan-penned remake of John Carpenter/Kurt Russell classic "Escape from New York" with Gerard Butler stepping behind the eye patch of Snake Plissken.

[milan]

Od Harija sa AICNA -

Mark Protosevich's brilliant THOR script to be directed by STARDUST's Matthew Vaughn!!!

Hey folks, Harry here... The week before I got married, I got a whole host of scripts. About 20 to be exact and in and amongst those was the latest script by Mark Protosevich (I AM LEGEND, JOHN CARTER OF MARS)... THOR.

I'm a huge THOR geek. Even got that Mjolnir replica they issued a few years back - and I constantly hope a burglar breaks into my house so I can smash his face with my uru hammer. (joke... kinda).

So when this script hit... I'm a huge fan of Protosevich... worked with him for quite some time on John Carter and he's a great guy to work with... intensely passionate about the material he's working on... and I kinda hate that I didn't get the script from Mark, cuz when he turned in his draft on JOHN CARTER - it came accompanied with a soundtrack cd he had made (that looked like Mars) that was made up of the music he was listening to, as he wrote the script. Richard Kelly does this too.

Anyway - I sat down and dove into the script. This isn't a Donald Blake, doctor on vacation story. Instead, this is a genuine TALES OF ASGARD story. In the first few pages the creation of everything takes place... the origin of the gods, their universe and how midgard (that's are place in the universe) came to be.

It has Thor and Loki as brothers - the best of friends... and it shows how that goes bad. The origin of the uru hammer, Thor being thrown from Asgard to being a mere mortal... it's a HUGE story - easily the most awesome script that a MARVEL project has ever had.

About 3 weeks ago, I heard they were talking to Matthew Vaughn... I'm a huge fan of Matthew's STARDUST. However, I'm sure Matthew knows this... but the tone of STARDUST and this THOR script are very very different. There can be no tongue in cheek, no broad comedy... this is an intense story or deception, quests and battles amongst gods. Protosevich channeled all the best from Kirby's universe and I hope to Odin that they take their visual cue from his work.

This has the chance to literally kick everything we have coming up's ass.

It's an epic step forward in ambition for Matthew Vaughn - I know MARVEL loves this script - I just hope they allow this project to live up to its potential. Now they have the hardest task of all... finding Thor. Me - there's a half crazed part of me that wants Ernest Borgnine to play ODIN - ala his Ragnar from THE VIKINGS. But that's probably just me.

[crippled_avenger]

Warner Bros. has picked up the rights to Oni Press' comicbook series "Maintenance," for McG's Wonderland Sound & Vision to produce and for the helmer to possibly direct.
Joe Ballarini is adapting the project, which follows the exploits of two janitors who work at Terrormax Inc., the world's leading manufacturer and supplier of weapons and doomsday devices to supervillains. As comicbook's conceit goes, if they're not too busy cleaning up toxic spills and performing menial repairs on time machines, they just might save the world.

"Some of the films that made me want to become a director like 'Back to the Future' and 'Raiders of the Lost Ark' are based on action, comedy and ground-breaking special effects," McG said. "It is my goal to make 'Maintenance' in the same tradition."

Comicbook series was created by Jim Massey and illustrated by Robbi Rodriguez.

Eric Gitter, who runs Oni's entertainment arm, Closed On Monday, will produce along with McG's shingle, Wonderland, which recently inked a three-year first look deal with WB.

Steven V. Scavelli will executive produce. Peter Schwerin, Joe Nozemack and James Lucas Jones will serve as co-producers.

Ballarini scripted "Witch Hunters," set up at New Regency that Kopelson Entertainment will produce. He also wrote "The Legendary McClouds" at Paramount, and MGM's "F+."

WB will release "Whiteout," based on another Oni graphic novel, sometime next year. Gitter is producing "Scott Pilgrim," with Marc Platt, and "Leading Man," both of which are set up at Universal. Oni also sold the rights to "Courtney Crumin" and "The Damned" to Walter Parkes and Laurie MacDonald at DreamWorks.

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William Hurt and German actor Daniel Bruhl have joined Julie Delpy's upcoming drama "The Countess" reports MTV News.

The film tells of Elizabeth Bathory, the famed Hungarian blood Countess of the 16th century. Of Hurt's character, Delpy says "he is playing the most Machiavellian [character]. He's not a murderer. He's a very powerful man. There's a lot of political intrigue."

Radha Mitchell and Vincent Gallo also star in the "romantic drama with a hint of a thriller" which begins shooting at the end of October.

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Whilst Mark Wahlberg is still the first choice to play Duke in the "G.I. Joe" film adaptation, now comes word that a certain "Transporter" may join the cast.

The IESB reports that Jason Statham is the first choice for Joe's British sidekick 'Action Man'. The characters will still be based from the original cartoons, toys and comics but with a globe-trotting flavor.

Skip Woods script was apparently written with Wahlberg and Statham specifically in mind and they are the first choice for Duke and Action Man. Elements of Woods' script and another one are being used for the new final draft.

Meanwhile it's been revealed at Latino Review that "The Mummy" helmer Stephen Sommers will not be directing the project after he apparently demanded too much money for the gig.

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Director Tarsem Singh ("The Cell") is set to helm the Warner Bros. Pictures science fiction thriller "The Unforgettable" says The Hollywood Reporter.

Originally titled "Species X," the story centers on a cop who in the course of a murder investigation realizes that he is not human and uncovers a war between good and evil aliens.

Kurt Sutter (TV's "The Shield") wrote the screenplay which is based in the 'same universe' as the well-reviewed and quite creepy 2005 PC & Xbox 360 videogame "Condemned: Criminal Origins."

That game's sequel, "Condemned 2: Bloodshot" will be released early 2008 and is expected to tie-in with the film. Basil Iwanyk, David Goyer and Jason Hall will produce.

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When Edward Norton said that he wrote the screenplay for the upcoming "The Incredible Hulk" at this year's San Diego Comic Con, people were left wondering what happened to original scribe Zak Penn's work? Now, The Los Angeles Times has the answer:

"Marvel hired [Zak] Penn, who wrote three drafts over a year. By spring 2007, Penn was about to go off to promote his movie "The Grand," but the studio and the director, Louis Leterrier ("The Transporter"), still felt that the screenplay needed work.

When Norton came in to meet about starring as Banner in April, the film had already been greenlighted and there were just three months before shooting was scheduled to begin. Norton had well-established (if underground) writing experience and strong ideas about how to separate the film from any confusion over its connection to the 2003 Ang Lee version by casting it in a more distinct, starting-over vein like "Batman Begins" or "Casino Royale."

So Norton's initial deal included payment not just for his acting services but for his writing talents too, with his draft contractually stipulated to be turned around in less than a month. As it turned out, Norton delayed work on another screenplay job to do "Hulk," and he continues to tweak the script as principal photography hits its halfway point outside Toronto."

Penn meanwhile is presently writing a big-budget version of another Marvel comic - "The Avengers."

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Variety reports that HBO and "Deadwood" creator David Milch are prepping what could be his next project - a NYPD police drama.

Sources say the project will follow a Vietnam veteran who returns to the U.S. in the early 1970s and joins the New York City police force.

With Milch's "John From Cincinnati" now officially canned, the cops project has now been revived. The anticipated pair of "Deadwood" movies to finish off that series is sadly seen as a longshot as the actors move on to other roles.

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Rosario Dawson will produce and star in "The Gemini Division," a live-action/motion-capture animation online sci-fi series and any potential TV series, feature film and game variations of the property says The Hollywood Reporter.

Electric Farm Entertainment will produce 100 three-minute episodes of "Gemini," which will star Dawson as a New York cop investigating the bizarre murder of her husband and who uncovers a global conspiracy involving the creation of simulated life forms that have assimilated with the unsuspecting public.

Dawson is not a stranger to the sci-fi genre, she created the comic book "Occult Crimes Taskforce" and is developing a feature based on it with the Weinstein Co., to which she is attached to star and produce.

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Jennifer Aniston is in final negotiations to join New Line Cinema's ensemble comedy "He's Just Not That Into You" says The Hollywood Reporter.

Jennifer Connelly, Kevin Connolly, Bradley Cooper, Justin Long, Ginnifer Goodwin and Drew Barrymore are already set to star in the Baltimore-set movie of interconnecting story arcs dealing with the challenges of reading or misreading human behavior.

Aniston will play a woman in a long-term relationship with a boyfriend who will not commit to marriage. Ken Kwapis will direct and Barrymore will produce.

Abby Kohn and Marc Silverstein ("Never Been Kissed") wrote the adaptation of Greg Behrendt and Liz Tuccillo's best-selling social commentary book. Shooting begins early September in Los Angeles.

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Bruce Dickinson-penned Chemical Wedding starts shooting
Wendy Mitchell in Edinburgh
16 Aug 2007 14:58

 

London-based Focus Films has started production on supernatural horror film Chemical Wedding. Julian Doyle, who edited Terry Gilliam's Brazil and Time Bandits, will direct.

The story is based on an original screenplay by Bruce Dickinson, frontman of Iron Maiden. Dickinson will provide the soundtrack to the film.

Warner Music has already taken on all UK and Ireland rights and plans a theatrical release in 2008. Edward Noeltner's Cinema Management Group is handling world sales.

Simon Callow will star as a modern Cambridge professor who becomes a re-incarnation of Aleister Crowley, the infamous occult scholar.

Focus Films' David Pupkewitz and Malcolm Kohll are producing with Ben Tilmlett and Justin Peyton of Bill and Ben Productions and Duellist Film Production in association with MotionFX and E-Motion. Executive producers are Andy Taylor, Paul Astrom-Andrews and Peter Dale.

Focus' previous projects include 51st State starring Samuel L Jackson. The company is also in pre-product noon Marleen Gorris' Heaven And Earth.

[marduk]

Bruce Dickinson-penned Chemical Wedding starts shooting
 
London-based Focus Films has started production on supernatural horror film Chemical Wedding. Julian Doyle, who edited Terry Gilliam's Brazil and Time Bandits, will direct.

The story is based on an original screenplay by Bruce Dickinson, frontman of Iron Maiden. Dickinson will provide the soundtrack to the film.

Krajnje bizarno, ali highly anticipated!!!  

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When word that Warners was rushing forward with development on their "Justice League" movie, speculation soon arose that the "Superman Returns" sequel would be delayed or cancelled.

The studio quickly denied this, and it has been confirmed that scribes Mike Dougherty, Dan Harris and Director Bryan Singer have been working on a script follow-up to last year's Supes film.

Now IESB.Net says that Kiernan and Michele Mulroney's script for the 'Justice' movie has been received and highly praised by the studio who want "the film to be the launching point for The Flash, Wonder Woman, The Green Lantern and Aquaman as well as rejuvenate Superman."

They even add that production would begin as soon as the first quarter of 2008, to avoid the pending writer's strike, in time for a Summer 2009 theatrical release. If true, then what does that mean for the "Superman" sequel?

Also speculation continues about casting as both Batman and Superman are key figures in the script - will Bale and Routh's contracts (both are signed for three films as their characters) fall under this agreement?

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JoBlo reports that Director Robert Rodriguez's girlfriend and "Planet Terror" star Rose McGowan is being used for FX test footage of the "Barbarella" remake.

Whether that means she'll play the famous intergalactic heroine is unsure. At last report, Kate Beckinsale was the front runner to take on the role made famous by Jane Fonda in the 60's psychedlic film adaptation.

The project, which will be far more faithful to the original comic, is scheduled to start principal photography before year's end.

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Natalie Martinez is negotiations to star as the romantic lead opposite Jason Statham in Paul W.S. Anderson's "Death Race" says Reuters.

Universal Pictures' remake of the Roger Corman cult classic sees Statham as a prisoner in a near future America who is coerced into being a driver in a road rally to the death. He soon becomes a crowd favorite called Frankenstein.

Martinez will play Case, a woman who is assigned to be Statham's navigator and ends up assisting him in his plan to escape the prison. She joins a cast that includes Joan Allen, Ian McShane and Tyrese Gibson.

Shooting is scheduled to start this month in Montreal.

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Seth Gordon ("The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters") is in final negotiations to direct "Four Christmases" for New Line Cinema reports the trades.

Reese Witherspoon and Vince Vaughn both produce and are starring in the movie, which follows a young married couple -- each one a child of divorced parents -- who struggle to attend four different Christmas Day family celebrations.

Matt Allen and Caleb Wilson penned the screenplay. Gordon is expected to helm this before the feature film remake of 'Kong' which he will also helm.

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Aussie actress Isla Fisher ("Wedding Crashers," "The Lookout") has signed on to star in "The Secret Dreamworld of a Shopaholic" for producer Jerry Bruckheimer reports JoBlo.

Based on Sophie Kinsella's novel "Confessions of a Shopaholic," Fisher will star as Rebecca Bloomwood, a recent college graduate working as a financial journalist in New York City.

Her shop-a-holic ways are causing the bills to pile up fast and she's forced to creatively find solutions to her mounting debt. Along the way she falls in love with a highly successful entrepreneur she's highlighting for the magazine.

Tracey Jackson ("The Guru") wrote the adaptation of Bloomwood's book and fellow Aussie PJ Hogan is set to direct. Filming is scheduled to begin this November in New York.

[crippled_avenger]

Morgan Freeman says that despite all the long delays, his planned adaptation of Arthur C. Clarke's legendary sci-fi novel "Rendezvous with Rama" is still in the works reports MTV.

Freeman says "It's a very intellectual science fiction film, a very difficult book to translate cinematically. [At least] we have found it very difficult to translate, to get ready for film...But it's worth doing. We're still at it."

The story follows investigation of a thirty-mile-long alien spaceship with mysterious origins that has been set adrift in our Solar System by an unknown intelligence.

Freeman says "I play the captain of the spaceship Endeavor that is charged with rendezvousing with this thing from outer space to find out what it is [and] what its intentions are."

David Fincher ("Se7en," "Fight Club") remains attached to direct.

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Carla Gugino has joined the cast of Millennium Films $60 million crime drama "Righteous Kill" says The Hollywood Reporter.

Jon Avnet directs the project and Russell Gewirtz wrote the screenplay which has Robert De Niro and Al Pacino playing New York cops chasing a serial killer.

Gugino has been cast as the female lead, a crime-scene investigator with a dark personal life who enters into a relationship with De Niro's character.

Gugino also recently signed on to the ensemble cast of the "Watchmen" comic adaptation.

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Jason Isaacs and Melissa George have joined the Jan de Bont-helmed action thriller "Stopping Power" for Intermedia Films and Action Concepts says Reuters.

John Cusack plays a man who races to rescue his kidnapped daughter. Isaacs will play Cusack's nemesis, and George will portray Cusack's girlfriend.

The film is slated to enter production in Berlin next month.

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Ron Livingston has joined Eric Bana and Rachel McAdams in "The Time Traveler's Wife" says Reuters.

New Line Cinema's adaptation of the Audrey Niffenegger novel is being directed by Robert Schwentke. Jeremy Leven and Bruce Joel Rubin wrote the adaptation.

The book tells the story of a dashing librarian (Bana) at Chicago's Newberry Library who has a gene that causes him to involuntarily time travel. He must help his wife cope with the many complications of his disorder as the two are often out of sync.

Livingston will play the man's friend, a liberal attorney who works for nonprofit organizations. A September shoot in Toronto is being planned.

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One of the biggest problems of doing a "Justice League" movie is not only the casting issues, but the expense of doing such a project.

A new report from IESB.Net however indicates that the problem may be solved quite easily - by making the film a CG motion capture project (ala "The Polar Express," "Beowulf").

The site says that Imageworks are apparently in the running to provide services on the film, competing with R&H and possibly WETA for the project.

This is good news - it allows the studio to proceed with filming on the project pre-strike as most of the work will be post-filming, it overcomes many budgeting issues as story options are practically unlimited, and rumors of George Miller's involvement also make more sense.

It also allows the studio's separate live action franchises to move forward without any confusion or detrimental impact - good news since its been confirmed that neither Christian Bale or Brandon Routh would've participated in a live-action 'League' flick.

Ryan Reynolds reluctantly admitted that he's still interested in playing "The Flash," the question is will he be a part of this, Shawn Levy's live-action "Flash" film or both.

If true, production would begin early next year for release likely in 2010.

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Kadokawa, Miike join forces to solve God's Puzzle
Jason Gray in Tokyo
20 Aug 2007 12:08

 

Japanese producer Haruki Kadokawa has announced that his next production will be an adaptation of Shinji Kimoto's award-winning science fiction novel Kamisama No Puzzle (God's Puzzle), to be directed by Takashi Miike.

The film will star Hayato Ichihara (All About Lily Chou-Chou) playing the dual role of identical twin university students. The film co-stars Mitsuki Tanimura (The Girl Who Leapt Through Time) as a genius class-cutter who joins the twins in conducting experiments to create their own 'Big Bang'.

The production will be decidedly smaller than Kadokawa's recent epics. The WWII-themed Yamato was a hit at the box office in 2005, earning $44.2m (Y5.09bn), but the March 2007 release Genghis Khan fell well below expectations, only managing to gross $12.1m (Y1.4bn) of its $25m budget.

"It's not a blood-filled story or the kind of film I typically make," said Miike of his first collaboration with the famous producer.

Miike's Sukiyaki Western Django will have its world premiere in competition at the upcoming Venice Film Festival and its North American premiere in the Toronto International Film Festival's Midnight Madness section prior to its September 15 domestic release.

Kamisama No Puzzle goes before cameras at the Nikkatsu Studios this week and is slated for a summer 2008 release.

[Meho Krljic]

[Ghoul]

ako se ovo odnosi na vest o novom miikeu, potpisujem! i dodajem:
   

[Meho Krljic]

Na šta bi drugo?

[Ghoul]

Na šta bi drugo?

i to što kažeš!    

[Shozo Hirono]

[crippled_avenger]

Oliver Stone is in final negotiations to direct the $40 million Vietnam War mystery drama "Pinkville" which Mikko Alanne is writing.

Based on a true story, Bruce Willis will play William R. Peers, the real-life Army general who investigated the infamous 1968 My Lai Massacre of up to 500 Vietnamese civilians by US soldiers - most of them unarmed women, children and elderly.

Channing Tatum will portray Hugh Thompson Jr., an Army helicopter pilot who helped stop the killing by flying between the attackers and the My Lai villagers, rescued survivors and later testified against the soldiers.

Michael Pena is in talks to play Capt. Ernest Medina, the tough commanding officer of the troops responsible for the massacre who was charged in the crimes but ultimately found not guilty.

United Artists is in talks to finance and distribute through MGM. Stone will go into production early next year.

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DreamWorks and Paramount have ditched plans for a platform release and will go wide with director Tim Burton's film adaptation of Stephen Sondheim's Broadway musical "Sweeney Todd" on December 21st.

Originally because of the very dark subject matter, the lead characters are serial killers who ground their victims into pie mince after all, the film was set for a platform release on the 21st and would've been rolled out through to a wide release January 11th - much like the studio did with last year's "Dreamgirls."

Now though with footage coming through, the studio is apparently seeing Johnny Depp's Todd character as something quite marketable - much like his Capt. Jack Sparrow role - and so are more confident in the property's ability to sell to an audience.

Unfortunately this has lead to questioning of the film's grizzly content reports British tabloid The New York Post. Footage of Depp slicing the throats of his victims in rather bloody ways, and body parts being cut up to be thrown in a meat grinder by a young boy, have apparently irked marketing executives who would like the blood toned down.

The question has now become about the film's rating - the material is R-rated by nature in many ways, but Burton is said to be under contract to deliver a PG-13 film, making one wonder how this is all going to pan out.

Helena Bonham Carter, Alan Rickman, Timothy Spall, Sacha Baron Cohen, Laura Michelle Kelly and Peter Bowles also star in the feature.

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George Lucas has hired John Ridley ("L.A. Riots") to write "Red Tails," a WWII action adventure about the Tuskegee Airmen based on a story by Lucas, who is financing and executive producing reports Variety.

The story charts a group of young pilots as they overcame racism to form the Tuskegee Airmen, a distinguished group of fliers who broke the aviation color barrier to become the first African-American fighter pilots in U.S. military history.

Ridley met with the surviving pilots at a convention in Texas and has just gotten to work on the production which will have effects done by ILM and have Rick McCallum producing.

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Filmick reports that Paul Verhoeven's next project will be an adaptation of Pete Dexter's "The Paperboy" to shoot in early 2008.

Set in and around Moat County Florida in the 1960s, the novel is a murder investigation - crusading journalist - serial killer mystery.

A decade ago Pedro Almodovar tried to put the film into production, but it never got off the ground.

Verhoeven's other new films "The Winter Queen" and "Kneeling on a Bed of Violets" are apparently still very much in the works.

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R&B singer Sean Kingston has apparently landed the lead role in the Notorious B.I.G. biopic reports Starpulse News Blog.

Kingston says, "When I first heard about that movie, it was through management. My management told me about it and you know I had auditioned for it and I met with the director and I nailed it and he gave me a shot now at being in the movie."

Notorious B.I.G.'s mother Voletta Wallace, and his two former managers, Wayne Barrow and Mark Pitts, played a key role in casting and were keen to sign-up an unknown star for the coveted role in the film which Sean 'Diddy' Combs is producing.

B.I.G., also known as Christopher Wallace, was shot to death in March 1997 outside a Los Angeles party.

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Alice Braga ("I Am Legend") has been cast as the female lead inUniversal's futuristic thriller "Repossession Mambo" says The Hollywood Reporter.

Based on Garcia's novel, the story follows Remy (Jude Law), a repo man made up of artificial organs, who receives a heart transplant. When he struggles to make the payments, he must go on the run from his former partner (Forest Whitaker).

Braga will play Beth, who married but lost touch with Remy while he was serving in the Army. Ten years later, Beth -- down on her luck and retrofitted with artificial organs -- is reunited with Remy as they seek to run.

Miguel Sapochnik is directing from a script by Eric Garcia and Garrett Lerner, whilst shooting is slated to begin October 15th in Toronto.

[crippled_avenger]

Writer/Director David S. Goyer talked with Wizard Universe recently about how the various film projects he has in development are going:

Magneto
"We've done some scouts and it mostly takes place in Europe and Argentina. We're doing budgets and we're sort of halfway crewed up, and so that'll be the big question: whether we can bring it in for a price."

The Invisible Man
"I'll be doing that next year.... I just randomly had this idea for what would sort of be a direct sequel, which literally starts like a month after the original Invisible Man in Victorian England. I went in and I pitched this whole thing to Universal and to [producer] Brian Grazer and they loved it. So we were off and running."

Heroes: Origins
"If I'm available, I'd love to do one. I think it would be fun, and I also like the idea that these origin episodes are self-contained and there's the opportunity to sort of stylistically go off in different directions."

Supermax
"We haven't even officially turned in a script for that yet. The idea is that they're mostly sort of third-tier DC villains, but that was part of the fun, that they're relatively obscure. But Icicle is in it from JSA—from my days on writing that. I mean, people will recognize most of them. What we did was present to DC a list of people we wanted, and then they went through it on a case-by-case basis and told us whether we could have them or not."

[crippled_avenger]

Kevin Smith has finished the first draft for his upcoming horror film "Red State" and it's one of the shortest works he's ever done.

On his ViewAskew site, Smith says "Not to say there's no dialogue; just that there's about half as much as I normally write. Unlike any other script I've ever authored, to say the least. Very fucked up. If I'd never said anything about it in the press and put it out under a pseudonym, I doubt anyone would ever connect me with it. Can't wait to shoot it."

He adds that "I have a hard time classifying it as a "horror flick" because, while it shares some of the genre conventions, it's just not what most would consider a horror flick. Horrific, yes, but not a horror flick in terms of the general definition. Let's put it this way: if "Rosemary's Baby" can be classified as a horror flick, then "Red State" can be as well."

"Clerks" stars Jeff Anderson and Jay Mewes are rumored to be on board.

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Celador Films and Film4 have greenlit Danny Boyle's "Slumdog Millionaire" for Warner Independent Pictures and Pathe likely to distribute reports Variety.

Based on true events, script by Simon Beaufoy ("The Full Monty") concerns an illiterate street kid from Mumbai who wins the jackpot on the Indian version of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?."

Brit newcomer Dev Patel (TV's "Skins") has been cast in the lead role. Shooting will begin in Mumbai November 5th.

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The long-rumored sequel to 80's teen classic "The Goonies" may be taking on a different form according to one of its stars. "Right now they are talking about the idea of doing it as an animated series," Corey Feldman recently revealed to MTV News.

Feldman though isn't holding his breath considering how many false starts that have already taken place on a sequel. "I would like to say that there's a great writer on it and it's coming soon [but] I have nothing for you. It's a film Spielberg very badly wanted to make [and] Richard Donner very badly wanted to make. All of us [the cast] really, really wanted to do it. It's come to the point of the script got ordered, and then the ball got dropped. For whatever reason, Warner Bros. doesn't see it as a profitable venture. It's a very sad, unfortunate story."

One script "at one point had me working in Vegas as a lounge guy, a Vegas shyster guy. Then there was another one where I was a trial lawyer...The one that I heard that worked the best was all of us were now grown up, and have [our own] kids. And those kids get into some trouble and end up stumbling across some link to our past. They discover who we really are and what we went through. And, simultaneously, the Fratelli brothers find out that the kids have found out – so they're out to get the kids and the kids are out to save their lives and their families" says Feldman.

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The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Posted: Fri., Aug. 31, 2007, 8:30am PT
A Warner Bros. release presented in association with Virtual Studios of a Scott Free/Plan B Entertainment production. Produced by Brad Pitt, Dede Gardner, Ridley Scott, Jules Daly, David Valdes. Executive producers, Brad Grey, Tony Scott, Lisa Ellzey, Benjamin Waisbren. Directed, written by Andrew Dominik, based on the novel by Ron Hansen.

Jesse James - Brad Pitt
Robert Ford - Casey Affleck
Frank James - Sam Shepard
Zee James - Mary-Louise Parker
Dick Liddil - Paul Schneider
Wood Hite - Jeremy Renner
Ed Miller - Garret Dillahunt
Dorothy Evans - Zooey Deschanel
Henry Craig - Michael Parks
Sheriff Timberlake - Ted Levine
Charley Ford - Sam Rockwell
Martha Bolton - Alison Elliott
Governor Crittenden - James Carville
Major George Hite - Tom Aldredge
Sarah Hite - Kailin See
Narrator - Hugh Ross


By TODD MCCARTHY

Brad Pitt plays legendary outlaw Jesse James in the Warner Bros. release.


A ravishing, magisterial, poetic epic that moves its characters toward their tragic destinies with all the implacability of a Greek drama, "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" is one of the best Westerns of the 1970s, which represents the highest possible praise. It's a magnificent throwback to a time when filmmakers found all sorts of ways to refashion Hollywood's oldest and most durable genre. Given the narrower current notion of what constitutes an acceptable commercial feature, Andrew Dominik's daring high-wire act will trod a very hard road to find secure theatrical footing, which suggests Warner Bros. might do best to nurture it in a small number of theaters in the hope that critical support and word of mouth will snowball into long runs and a slow rollout.
Whether it directly resembles them or not, this impeccable new picture is at one with the adventurous spirit that produced such films as "McCabe & Mrs. Miller," "Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid," "Bad Company," "The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid," "Jeremiah Johnson," "The Outlaw Josey Wales," "Days of Heaven," "The Long Riders" and, yes, "Heaven's Gate," rather than with anything being made today.

Shot two years ago and long delayed in editing, pic marks an enormous advance for Dominik beyond his 2000 Aussie prison crimer "Chopper." Elegant, artful and consumed by a fascination with American history and Western lore, his adaptation of Ron Hansen's popular 1983 novel retills the once overworked ground of outlaw legend so thoroughly that it has become fertile once again. Pic's hefty 160-minute running time will no doubt cause carping in some quarters, but this is one film whose length seems absolutely right for what it's doing.

Meticulously noting dates and locations, and framing the story's long arc with discreetly distanced narration, yarn commences on Sept. 5, 1881, just prior to the last train robbery pulled off by the James gang in their 14-year career . After this spectacularly staged nocturnal job, the older surviving brother, Frank (Sam Shepard), calls it quits and disappears back East, leaving Jesse (Brad Pitt), who's 34, to continue with the help of dubious lowlifes such as the Ford boys.

Most questionable member of the latter clan is 19-year-old Robert (Casey Affleck), whose wimpy demeanor, thin, unemphatic voice and irritatingly sycophantic manner mark him as a singularly unpromising gunslinger.

But even when Jesse returns to his life with wife and children under the alias of Thomas Howard, he can't quite bring himself to get rid of Bob, a leech who has collected every dime novel written about his hero. Jesse is both appalled and amused , at one point taunting Bob with the question, "You want to be like me, or you want to be me?"

Although arrestingly different from the outset, pic initially feels over-elaborated; shots in which the edges are purposely blurred, and a soundtrack too conspicuously mixed to emphasize ambient sounds of insects and weather, warn of incipient pretension. Fears also gather that Dominik has no intention of supplying the film with enough dramatic traction to sustain interest over the long haul, as the deliberate pacing seems designed to accommodate numerous embellishments and digressions.

But any sense of viewer impatience is soon overtaken by the film's accumulation of detail on every front -- narrative, historical, folkloric, behavioral and psychological. Pitching the dialogue in a way that neatly injects prairie twang with a literary lyricism, Dominik settles into an expansive narrative strategy of the sort often found in novels and longform series, wherein the story skips and meanders among events whose relevance and meaning may be initially unclear, but which are all there for good reasons.

While Jesse cools his heels and smokes his big cigars at home, attention shifts to cohorts Charley Ford (Sam Rockwell), Bob's grinning older brother; Jesse's cousin, the homely Wood Hite (Jeremy Renner), and Dick Liddil (Paul Schneider), a self-styled ladies' man . Jesse's shadow hovers over them all, and narrative's dominant ploy is that the other characters are constantly afraid that Jesse, no matter where he is, will find out about any transgressions on their part and will come after them.

Which, in fact, he does. Intensely aware of his legendary status and willing to play it up when it suits him, especially with the worshipful Bob, this Jesse James is both paranoid that everyone's out to get himand resigned to the fact that his days are numbered. His antennae for sensing when something is amissare almost supernaturally acute, and he takes more than one long journey to track down people plotting against him . The irony is that the man he really needs to have his eye on is the one closest to him.

Eventually, the long-ineffectual authorities get into the act, setting in place the mechanism leading to Bob Ford's almost ritual killing of Jesse as he dusts a picture frame in his house. But that's not all, as the final half-hour provides its own fascination in playing out the strange fate of the man whose fame came with its own curse.

At least as conceived here, Jesse James is the biggest celebrity in the land, and Pitt generously endows the character with the droit de signeur he switches on at will. Thesp emphasizes Jesse's mercurial nature, but in a way that suggests much of it is calculated, a strategy that, until the end, he uses to manipulate events . It's a layered, continually interesting performance.

Affleck makes an indelible impression as the insecure, physically unprepossessing weakling who endures no end of humiliation, and eventually embodies the sort of nobody who has bloodied American history from time to time to insure his own immortality.

Rockwell's effectively drawn Charley Ford is weak, but in a different way than his brother, always ducking to stay out of trouble, and he's a good foil for the other, more withdrawn rural men. Supporting turns are vivid all around, including a vibrant cameo by political strategist James Carville as a big-shot governor.

Even those who resist the film itself will be in awe of its surpassing visual beauty and consummate craftsmanship. Just when it seemed that cinematographer Roger Deakins had achieved another career high with "No Country for Old Men," he trumps himself yet again, here using a subdued palette of parched-plains earth tones captured with an extraordinary luminosity and delicacy.

Made on various Canadian locations, pic boasts great production values from top to bottom.

Camera (Technicolor, widescreen), Roger Deakins; editors, Dylan Tichenor, Curtiss Clayton; music, Nick Cave, Warren Ellis; art director, Troy Sizemore; art director (Winnipeg), Martin Gendron; set designers, Grant Van Der Slagt, Marilyn Humphreys, Brad Milburn, Gordon White, Terry Gunvordahl, Michael Madden; set designers (Winnipeg), Rejean Labrie, Ricardo Alms; costume designer, Patricia Norris; sound (Dolby Digital/DTS/SDDS), D. Bruce Carwardine; sound designers, Richard King, Leslie Shatz, Christopher Aud; supervising sound editor, King; re-recording mixers, D.H. Hemphill, Ron Bartlett; special effects supervisor, James Paradis; visual effects, CIS Hollywood; stunt coordinators, Billy Burton, Brent Woolsey; associate producer, Ron Hansen; assistant director, Scott Andrew Robertson; casting, Mali Finn; Canadian casting, Jackie Lind, Deb Green. Reviewed at Warner Bros. studios, Burbank, Aug. 21, 2007. (In Venice Film Festival -- competing; Toronto, Deauville film festivals.) MPAA Rating: R. Running time: 160 MIN.

[crippled_avenger]

Wild Bunch boosts strong Toronto slate with addition of $22m Terra
Nancy Tartaglione-Vialatte in Paris
03 Sep 2007 03:00

 

Wild Bunch has acquired worldwide rights outside English-speaking territories to the $22 million animated project Terra, which will screen in a gala world premiere at Toronto. The film is directed by Aristomenis Tsirbas and has a voice cast including Luke Wilson, Evan Rachel Wood, Danny Glover, Dennis Quaid, Rosanna Arquette, Brian Cox and Chris Evans.

The acquisition was handled by Agnes Mentre on behalf of Wild Bunch with CAA retaining North American, US, UK (and New Zealand), Australian and South African rights.

Billed as a "reverse alien invasion" story, the film follows a precocious alien girl whose father is abducted during a hostile invasion of their home planet, Terra. In order to try save her father, the girl kidnaps a crashed and injured human pilot and then tries tow rok with him to broker peace between the planets.

Wild Bunch also has three other new additions to its slate for Toronto: Choke by Clark Gregg, White Material by Claire Denis and Vinyan by Fabrice du Welz.

Gregg, who is also a well-known US TV actor, did script duty on Robert Zemeckis' 2000 thriller What Lies Beneath and makes his directorial debut with Choke. The film is an adaptation of Chuck Palahniuk's blackly comic novel and stars Anjelica Huston, Sam Rockwell and Kelly Macdonald. It will be ready for Sundance.

Claire Denis marks a departure with White Material, a quasi-action film that takes place in an unnamed African country ravaged by rebellion. Isabelle Huppert, Christophe Lambert and Nicolas Duvauchelle star. The $8.2m (Euros 6m) film will be ready for Cannes.

Vinyan, Fabrice du Welz's follow up to 2004's Calvaire, recently wrapped shooting in Thailand. The film stars Emmanuelle Beart and Rufus Sewell as they search for their son whom they had believed perished during the 2004 tsunami.

Also in Toronto, Wild Bunch will screen the gala world premiere of Alain Corneau's Deuxieme Souffle, a remake of the Jean-Pierre Melville classic starring Daniel Auteuil and Monica Bellucci.

In the Real to Reel section, Wild Bunch has documentary My Enemy's Enemy from The Last King Of Scotland director Kevin Macdonald about Klaus Barbie.

Hana Makhmalbaf's Buddha Collapsed Out Of Shame will have its world premiere in the Visions section - before running in competition in San Sebastian - while Rolf de Heer's Dr. Plonk sees its international premiere in the same sidebar.

After screening out of competition in Venice, Woody Allen's Cassandra's Dream gets its North American premiere in Toronto. Im Kwon Tek's Beyond The Years follows a similar path; screening out of competition in Venice followed by a North American premiere in Toronto.

Wild Bunch also does double duty with Claude Chabrol's A Girl Cut In Two which screens out of competition in Venice before running in the Masters section in Toronto. In its first two weeks of French release, the film has sold 500,000 tickets.

Wild Bunch title La Zona from Rodrigo Pla has its world premiere in Venice Days and will subsequently screen in Toronto's Discovery sidebar. Ambitious animated film Max & Co will have a berth in the Toronto Family Zone – the film recently won the audience award at the Annecy Animation Festival.

Hiner Saleem's Beneath The Rooftops Of Paris, which scored a best actor prize for Michel Piccoli at Locarno, runs in Visions in Toronto.

In Venice, Wild Bunch has two further films in the Horizons competition: Damien Odoul's The Story Of Richard O and a documentary from Arnaud Desplechin, L'Aimee.

Completed films rounding out Wild Bunch's slate include Cannes Palme d'Or winner 4 Months, 3 Weeks And 2 Days for which there are a handful of remaining territories available; The Orphanage, produced by Guillermo del Toro, again with a few remaining territories and Barbet Schroeder's Terror's Advocate.

New promo reels will be available for Gilles de Maistre's The First Cry, the animated Go West! A Lucky Luke Adventure, Vera Belmont's Surviving With Wolves and Pascal Laugier's Martyrs while footage from Jaco Van Dormael's Mr Nobody will also be screened. Mr Nobody is currently shooting and stars Jared Leto, Sarah Polley, Diane Kruger and Rhys Ifans.

Films currently in pre- and post-production on Wild Bunch's slate include Jerome Salle's Largo Winch, Steven Soderbergh's Che, Luc Jaquet's The Fox And The Child and Morgan Spurlock's Where In The World.

[crippled_avenger]

Stopping Power forced to stop $40m shoot over financing issues
Martin Blaney in Berlin
02 Sep 2007 12:50

 

Principal photography on Jan de Bont's $40m action thriller Stopping Power has had to be suspended after the default of a key equity investor in the film made it impossible for the Internationalmedia Group to close the required financing.

The investor's breach has led to the IM Internationalmedia wholly-ownd subsidiary IM Stopping Power GmbH having to file for insolvency.

In a press communique, IM Internationalmedia stated that "the ramifications of the insolvency on other companies in the Internationalmedia Group" were "currently under investigation."

The company added that it was also looking "for alternative investors and assumes that production can be continued shortly."

The film, which is being handled internationally by IM Global and was set to star John Cusack, Melissa George and Jason Isaacs, had been due to begin shooting in the east German state of Sachsen-Anhalt from Weds, Sept 5.

[crippled_avenger]

After months of vacillating and speculation, Sacha Baron Cohen is ready to follow "Borat" with two starring film roles.
The comic thesp is firming plans to next star in "Bruno," the Media Rights Capital-financed picture based on his fashion reporter character. Universal will distribute in the U.S. and other English-speaking territories.

After Baron Cohen completes that film, his intention is to follow with "Dinner for Schmucks," a DreamWorks remake of the French comic hit "Le Diner de Cons," from Francis Veber. A deal has not been closed and the timing of that project is still indefinite.

Jay Roach will direct "Dinner" and Walter Parkes and Laurie MacDonald are producing. Roach was a producer on "Borat" and is producing "Bruno."

"Dinner for Schmucks" hasn't yet been completely pieced together, and is subject to several variables. Roach committed to replace Sydney Pollack as the director of "Recount," an HBO pic about the drama behind the 2000 presidential election that is being timed for the heat of the 2008 presidential election.

Both he and Baron Cohen will have to get past their fall projects and leave DreamWorks enough time to shoot "Schmucks" before next June.

David Guion and Michael Handelman wrote the most recent draft of "Schmucks," a Veber project that Baron Cohen attached himself to in 2003. The French film focused on a weekly dinner party held by a Paris publisher who challenges his friends to bring the most pathetic guest to the gathering. Cohen will play a character blessed with such extraordinary schmuckiness that he can destroy the personal life of anyone with whom he comes in contact.

Baron Cohen just worked with Parkes and MacDonald on the Tim Burton-directed "Sweeney Todd," playing Signor Adolfo Pirelli, rival to the Demon Barber of Fleet Street (Johnny Depp).

[crippled_avenger]

HONG KONG -- Hong Kong-based helmer Fruit Chan is to direct an English-language remake of Japanese horror "Don't Look Up" (Joyuu-rei).
Pic is to be produced by South Africa's Distant Horizon group in association with Japan's Action 5.

Story features a film production in Transylvania which is tainted by an old piece of celluloid containing images of a woman's murder. Distant Horizon topper Anant Singh said that "Don't Look Up," will shoot at the end of the year, with locations likely taking in studios in Romania and South Africa.

"I loved the original film by Hideo Nakata," Chan told Variety. "And I was happy to take on the remake. For too long I've been labeled as an art-house director. I'm a director." Pic will be the first in English-language for Chan, who previously directed "Made in Hong Kong" and most recently helmed the creepy "Dumplings."

Singh and Distant Horizon's Brian Cox will produce, along with Yoko Asakura of Action 5. Pic will also be presented at upcoming PPP project mart in Pusan where further financiers may be brought on board.

The remake rights were bought from WoWow-subsidiary Suncent Cinema Works in 2003 and Distant Horizon previously sought Nakata to remake his own film. "Joyuu-Rei" was produced in 1996 by Bandai Visual, with Bitters End and WoWow.

Separately, Distant Horizon has hired scripters Eddie and Chris Borey ("Open Grave") for the company's revival of "Fu Manchu," which it announced earlier this year at Cannes. "Fu Manchu" will be produced by Singh and Cox with Harry Alan Towers and Maria Rohm, who were key figures in the 1960s "Fu Manchu" film series starring Christopher Lee.

[crippled_avenger]

Has the cyber age finally caught up with Steven Lisberger?
The pioneering writer-director of 1982's "Tron" has sold "Soul Code," a futuristic tale he penned at the instigation of IGN hostess Jessica Chobot, to Reliant Pictures for mid-six figures.

Lisberger will direct the story of a tech pioneer who has perfected a way to download and transfer a person's memory. Script examines what happens when her memory is placed into a much younger woman's body.

"The same way 'Tron' was ahead of its time, this is way ahead of its time," said Reliant topper Thom Mount, who will tap into the shingle's credit facility with Allied Irish Bank to finance the production.

Lisberger met Chobot, a comely tech guru with a devoted following among the geek set, at a "Tron" screening and was quickly intrigued by her fresh femme take on a male-dominated arena. The two soon began hatching a story about the dangers of cyberspace from a distinctly female point of view.

"Jess is not a film person -- she was a fan -- and that was refreshing," Lisberger said. "She wasn't double-thinking what the audience wants; she was the audience."

Lisberger, who has been involved with several post-"Tron" projects that never got off the ground, said this one "felt different from the get-go." When he finished the script, his longtime agent Tom Chasin took it to Mount, a former topper at Universal whom he had known for years.

In 1979, Lisberger founded the Santa Monica studio where many of the pioneering computer graphics techniques used in "Tron" were developed. Many visual effects gurus worked at Lisberger Studios back then, including Roger Allers ("The Lion King") and Brad Byrd.

"It was so exciting," Lisberger said. "We knew were on the brink of something."

After "Tron," Lisberger directed "Hot Pursuit," starring John Cusack, and "Slipstream," with Mark Hamill, before retrenching to focus on his writing. He wrote a "Tron" sequel several years ago but the movie stalled amid Mouse House regime changes. (A 2003 videogame tie-in, however, sold extremely well.)

Throughout it all, Chasin tried to find jobs on Lisberger's behalf. The veteran tenpercenter, whose father was Lew Wasserman's lieutenant at MCA before forming Chasin-Park-Citron agency, lambastes the impatient "what have you done for me lately" mindset at his bigger rivals these days.

Lisberger has also become more jaded about cyberspace in the intervening years. He credits Chobot for re-energizing his creative muse, noting that he really didn't have a project to which he felt a real connection until they cooked up "Soul Code." This project, he said, is the type he wanted to explore 25 years ago, when he was developing "Tron."

Sure, it took a while, Lisberger admitted, "But one's never really prepared for how long it takes to get things done."

[crippled_avenger]

LONDON -- Julian Doyle's "Chemical Wedding," penned by Bruce Dickinson, frontman for the heavy metal band Iron Maiden, has been nabbed by Warner Bros. for U.K. and Ireland distribution rights.

The film, billed as a supernatural horror thriller, wrapped principal photography Tuesday and stars Simon Callow as a reincarnation of Aleister Crowley, once dubbed "the most evil man in Britain."

Veteran Monty Python second-unit director Doyle is directing the picture, which centers on Crowley, a major Edwardian figure and a scandalous character brought back to life by a shy, stuttering Professor Haddo (Callow).

Focus Films' David Pupkewitz and Malcolm Kohll are producing with Ben Timlett and Justin Peyton of Bill and Ben Prods. and Duellist Film in association with Motion FX and E-Motion.

Andy Taylor, Rod Smallwood, Paul Astrom-Andrews and Peter Dale are executive producers.
 

Worldwide sales on "Chemical Wedding" are being handled by Cinema Management Group, headed by veteran foreign sales executive Edward Noeltner.

No financial details were available.

Pupkewitz said Warner Bros. also had a first-look option "on a slew of other territories" for the film should it decide to activate those rights.

[crippled_avenger]

Pedro Almodóvar's long-planned vengeance tale "La piel que habito," an adaptation of French novel "Mygale," is being put aside for now as he focuses on another project.

Almodóvar is now using an original screenplay as the possible basis of his next film, with a starring role for Penélope Cruz reports Variety.

Blanca Portillo ("Volver") and Lluis Homar ("The Bad Education") will also star in a story that features five or six key roles, one earmarked for Cruz.

Why not do 'Piel'? "I need to be completely sure about it. The new story has characters from a universe which is familiar to me and makes me feel more involved."

[crippled_avenger]

Warner Bros. Pictures has picked up the feature rights to 1980's anime classic "Robotech," which featured giant robots known as mechas says The Hollywood Reporter.

Actor Tobey Maguire is producing and is eyeing the lead role in what the studio plans on being a tentpole sci-fi franchise.

A sprawling sci-fi epic, "Robotech" takes place at a time when Earth has developed giant robots from the technology on an alien spacecraft that crashed on a South Pacific isle. Mankind is forced to use the technology to fend off three successive waves of alien invasions.

The first invasion concerns a battle with a race of giant warriors who seek to retrieve their flagship's energy source known as "protoculture," and the planet's survival ends up in the hands of two young pilots.

The original "Robotech" was a re-edited and re-dialogued to combine three Japanese anime series to give the producers enough episodes to air as a daily syndicated series.

Craig Zahler ("The Brigands of Rattleborge") has been tapped to write the screenplay.

[crippled_avenger]

Quint nabs the first interview with Roger Avary about CASTLE WOLFENSTEIN!!!
Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. I first met Roger Avary when I was a teenager, back in the early days of me writing on this site. If I remember correctly Harry introduced us at DragonCon in 1998 and then promptly left for some obligation so we just sat and had a conversation for half an hour or so.

Being the stupid 17 year old I was, the very first thing I blurted out was "So, what's up with you and Tarantino?" This was at the height of the big rumored feud between the two. Even though I broached it with a complete lack of finesse or subtlety, Avary's response was very warm and a touch sad. He said the whole thing was blown out of proportion. There were things that had happened, small things, that drove a wedge between them, but there was no active hatred on his part and his mutual friends he had with Tarantino said the same thing was going on with Quentin. He said he had hoped one day they'd be able to get back together as friends and that did eventually happen.

Over the years Roger has been instrumental on getting me access to a few things he's been involved with, including his own RULES OF ATTRACTION (click here and read that report) and my visit to the BEOWULF offices 2 years ago (click here to read that one!).

When it was announced that he was adapting the CASTLE WOLFENSTEIN series into film I asked if we could do a short email interview about it and the result is the following chat.

It's still early days, but Avary is surprisingly open and transparent about the state the film is in currently, what his dreams are and an overall view of his plans.

Enjoy!!!

Quint: Alright... Wolfenstein. What's interesting about adapting this property to me is that there really isn't a set storyline that you might be tied to. I might be talking completely out of my ass here, but what I remember of Wolfenstein 3-D and Return to Castle Wolfenstein is very little plot, but a lot of fucked up Nazi occult stuff. Am I wrong or did you pick this project because of the fun you can have with the situation, the setting and the creatures?
Roger Avary: I first played Castle Wolfenstein on an Apple II, but it wasn't until Romero & Hall's masterpiece Wolfenstein3D that I wanted to realize the adventures of B.J. Blazkowicz on the big screen. I mean, what's not to love? It's a WWII "guys on a mission" movie, which means you're going to be blowing shit up, storming bunkers, busting dams, derailing trains, and killing Nazi's. I love WWII films, but with Wolfenstein we get the creature effects as well, and the guys at id Software have already done all the heavy lifting for me in that department. They went to the imagination well and pulled up buckets of craziness -- and as you know, I respond to crazy.
Quint: I've always defended video games from people who say it is impossible to make a good movie based off of a video game. I view it as just another adaptation. You can just as easily fuck up a book or a comic, and there are plenty examples of projects that have, but it's all about the people making it. I think your approach to SILENT HILL was the closest we've come to a movie that took what worked in the video game and translated it to the screen. What is your approach on WOLFENSTEIN?
Roger Avary: The reason people say that is because they develop a proprietary relationship with the avatar they're playing. They control the moves, they navigate the universe, they become the character themselves -- and it's difficult and frustrating for them to relinquish that control over to a third party. Also, it should be said that the writing and acting in most videogames isn't stellar to begin with, so it's a bit of an uphill climb to perform an adaptation that both lives up to people's expectations and improves on the original's deficiencies.

John Milius once told me a story that went something like this (and I'm doing my best to paraphrase here): Stanley Kubrick called him up one day, wanting some advice on buying "the best handgun ever produced." Obviously, Milius is the guy you call when you want to buy a gun. His one requirement was that the weapon must have "never been fired." Milius thought about it, and told him that it would be a Colt .45 Special produced in 1942. He then warned Kubrick that to find this particular handgun in mint condition would be nearly impossible. "Money is no object!" Kubrick told him. Months passed and eventually Kubrick received a call from Milius: "Stanley," he told him, "I found the gun. Not only has it never been fired, but it's in the original box!" Kubrick was delighted, money changed hands, and the gun was shipped to England, where Kubrick lived. A few months later, Milius calls Kubrick to ask "How did you like the gun?" To which Kubrick responded, "Oh! I love it! I re-bored the barrel and realigned the bead, swapped out the Mahogany handle for Mother of Pearl, changed out the hammer, and swapped out the pins." Milius was aghast, "You've -- you've -- you've destroyed it!" To which Kubrick responded "NO! I MADE IT BETTER!"

When performing an adaptation one needs to be willing to disassemble and recreate from scratch, as Kubrick famously did with THE SHINING. And whenever someone whines to me about breaking canon, be it with THE RULES OF ATTRACTION, SILENT HILL, or even BEOWULF, I remind them that the original book, videogame, or poem will ALWAYS exist in its original form for their enjoyment, but that a movie has special needs and compromises that occur due to a variety of real-world constrictions. Making a movie is not unlike building a house. You can plan all you want that your house is going to have a copper roof, but when there's a shortage of copper, or your local building codes restrict it, or whatever reason happens that prevents you from putting copper on your roof, you sometimes have to compromise and go with tin. And sometimes, by the good fortunes of the universe, your compromises make the film better than if you had all the resources possible. You're not always going to have the technocrane you need, or the actor you dreamed about, and so you roll with what the universe delivers, and you make it the best it can be with the limitations that rain down onto you. Sometimes, the bond company forces you to cut pages -- and the trick is to roll with those compromises and make it work regardless. Fans of source material are pretty rigid, and always think they could have done it better, and maybe sometimes they could have -- but most filmmakers who have undergone the trial by fire of making a movie understand the dance one has to undergo over the process of making a movie.

Quint: In many ways, as strange as it is to say this, SILENT HILL is a bit more higher brow than WOLFENSTEIN. Does that play a factor in how you approach the material? What kind of tone are we to expect?
Roger Avary: I was given a story bible by id Software, which outlined the dos and do nots of the Wolfenstein franchise. Primarily it outlined who B.J. Blazkowicz is and what kind of behavior I should be mindful of. For example, B.J. respects action and bravery over rank and discipline; he must not act as a traitor or for personal gain; he is not racist or an anti-Semite; etc., the list goes on and on. I was really grateful to be given these specific guidelines by the creators of the character because I want to be as true as possible to the spirit of the Wolfenstein franchise, and to the proud tradition of WWII "guys on a mission" movies that inspired the game. Return to Castle Wolfenstein is a very specific kind of adventure, and my intent is to make an experience that's true to the franchise and very different from my other work as a director.
Quint: What are you going to make sure is included in the movie? What can you not wait to see realized onscreen? Will we see Robot Hitler?
Roger Avary: I'm attempting to strike a balance between the over-the-top elements of the Wolfenstein franchise with a certain quotient of reality.
Quint: Setting? Castle? Countryside? Both?
Roger Avary: Castle Wolfenstein is a given -- a primary character of the film, even. Our story will take us to a variety of surrounding locations, however. And it will, of course, take place during WW2 in the European theater of operations.
Quint: Do you have a script yet? If not, when are you going to begin writing? What kind of research are you doing?
Roger Avary: I like to write on location, so I'm about to leave for Castle Wollensberg, which was Himmler's base of operation for his Paranormal Unit. I've also been watching every World War Two film ever made.
Quint: I know this is early, but what is your gut telling you about casting? New faces? Character actors? Known actors?
Roger Avary: With a movie of this scale it's almost a certainty that we'll need to anchor it with known leads. But I'm trying to build an ensemble of talent, tapping into the wealth of European actors for roles like Dr. Otto Giftmacher and of course Hilda von Bulow. As for B.J., all one needs to do is look at the box art on the Return to Castle Wolfenstein game and you can see who I see in my mind for the role.
Quint: When do you plan on shooting? Where do you plan on shooting?
Roger Avary: Well, the looming strike is wreaking havoc with the entire industry, so I can't say with certainty that we'll be able to make our planned start date next spring. If it happens, I'm going to be spending the entirety of next year in Paris working with my tech crew prepping the complex creature effects and miniatures. The strike for me will mostly mean that I have triple the prep time, so I might try to squeeze in a quick micro-budget movie I've been planning to shoot with my new RED Camera. Since I'm financing it myself I don't need to worry about the bond company restrictions on drop dates. I'll probably spend much of early next year scouting a variety of Eastern European locations for Castle Wolfenstein, bunkers, derelict submarine bases, villages, warehouses, etc.