James Hunt Oct 9, 2017
Playable DC characters are part of new Moba game Arena Of Valour. We took a look...
Arena Of Valor, which you might also have heard of under its Chinese name King Of Glory, is a 5v5 Moba game developed by Tencent games, makers of the ultra-popular League Of Legends. In many respects, it looks, feels and plays like its stablemate, though with once major difference: this one has playable DC characters in. Is that enough to make you give it a shot? Well, it was for us.
The game’s forthcoming western release means anyone engaging with it will soon be able to take advantage of an absolutely huge userbase. With a reported 80 million daily players worldwide, and 200 million unique players every month, you’re unlikely to be stuck for co-players. At least, we never were.
And indeed, if you, like us, are more of a pick-up-and-play gamer,...
Playable DC characters are part of new Moba game Arena Of Valour. We took a look...
Arena Of Valor, which you might also have heard of under its Chinese name King Of Glory, is a 5v5 Moba game developed by Tencent games, makers of the ultra-popular League Of Legends. In many respects, it looks, feels and plays like its stablemate, though with once major difference: this one has playable DC characters in. Is that enough to make you give it a shot? Well, it was for us.
The game’s forthcoming western release means anyone engaging with it will soon be able to take advantage of an absolutely huge userbase. With a reported 80 million daily players worldwide, and 200 million unique players every month, you’re unlikely to be stuck for co-players. At least, we never were.
And indeed, if you, like us, are more of a pick-up-and-play gamer,...
- 10/3/2017
- Den of Geek
Den Of Geek Dec 22, 2016
Game Of Thrones, Black Mirror, Stranger Things, Westworld... Did your favourite TV episode of 2016 make the cut?
Earlier this month, twenty-five of Den Of Geek's writers nominated up to five of their favourite television episodes of the year, ranked in order of preference. Points were allocated. Favourites emerged. And the sanity of the site's TV editor was offered once again as a festive sacrifice to the God of Microsoft Excel worksheets.
See related Justin Kurzel interview: Assassin’s Creed
Over sixty individual episodes were nominated in total, and below are the fifteen that placed highest overall...
15. Scream season 2 episode 10 – The Vanishing
This show has hit a beautiful stride over the past two episodes, and we’re now set up for what could be a top-notch finale. While we’ve been given plenty of clues—some of which I’m sure will be forehead-slappers after the killer...
Game Of Thrones, Black Mirror, Stranger Things, Westworld... Did your favourite TV episode of 2016 make the cut?
Earlier this month, twenty-five of Den Of Geek's writers nominated up to five of their favourite television episodes of the year, ranked in order of preference. Points were allocated. Favourites emerged. And the sanity of the site's TV editor was offered once again as a festive sacrifice to the God of Microsoft Excel worksheets.
See related Justin Kurzel interview: Assassin’s Creed
Over sixty individual episodes were nominated in total, and below are the fifteen that placed highest overall...
15. Scream season 2 episode 10 – The Vanishing
This show has hit a beautiful stride over the past two episodes, and we’re now set up for what could be a top-notch finale. While we’ve been given plenty of clues—some of which I’m sure will be forehead-slappers after the killer...
- 12/19/2016
- Den of Geek
Here's the first of our episode-by-episode annotations of Marvel's Daredevil series, released today on Netflix...
With the whole series of Daredevil now available on Netflix, the race is on to reach the ending before someone spoils it for you. But that presents us with a problem. How do we approach reviews? It's not much use speculating about the future of the series when it's available at a moment's notice, but watching the whole thing in one go for a single review is impractical for anyone with a day job and personal relationships to maintain – to say nothing of how difficult it is to critically appraise 12 hours of television if you don't savour the instalments properly.
That's why, instead of traditional reviews, we're trying something new. An episode-by-episode unpicking of the show, looking at its techniques, characters and use of the source material. Call them annotations, call them show notes, call...
With the whole series of Daredevil now available on Netflix, the race is on to reach the ending before someone spoils it for you. But that presents us with a problem. How do we approach reviews? It's not much use speculating about the future of the series when it's available at a moment's notice, but watching the whole thing in one go for a single review is impractical for anyone with a day job and personal relationships to maintain – to say nothing of how difficult it is to critically appraise 12 hours of television if you don't savour the instalments properly.
That's why, instead of traditional reviews, we're trying something new. An episode-by-episode unpicking of the show, looking at its techniques, characters and use of the source material. Call them annotations, call them show notes, call...
- 4/10/2015
- by louisamellor
- Den of Geek
What a busy twelve months it’s been for costume design. Really though, this art, or craft, or business (Deborah Nadoolman Landis insists it is definitely a business) gets more talked about each year. 2013 was especially exciting however as it seemed every month something even more thrilling arrived to fawn over. In the last few weeks alone we have had The Hunger Games: Catching Fire and Sleepy Hollow, and now American Hustle and The Wolf of Wall Street on the horizon. Dipping back further, it was Stoker that got us excited about subtext, The Great Gatsby that slammed the lid on that twenties revival once and for all, and Behind the Candelabra that put Michael Douglas in a 16ft fox fur cape and white brocade jumpsuit.
With just so many memorable movies and TV shows to cover, Clothes on Film asked some respected contributors to the site for their opinions on the best,...
With just so many memorable movies and TV shows to cover, Clothes on Film asked some respected contributors to the site for their opinions on the best,...
- 12/28/2013
- by Lord Christopher Laverty
- Clothes on Film
The title of this panel was Financing and Packaging: From Indie to Studio, but in fact, the most studio-like film, Rush , by the major director, Ron Howard, and produced by Brit indie production company Revolution (Andrew Eaton) and Hollywood-based Cross Creek (Brian Oliver), is actually quite independent.
Rush (U.S. Universal, International Sales by Exclusive)
Ron Howard and his producing partner Brian Grazer whose imagine Entertainment have had an overall deal at Universal for 27 years, however, this mid-budget range film of some $50,000,000 was considered not "big enough" for the majors.
To read more about this complex and fascinating film and its international film business background, read the following articles which are quoted throughout this article with thanks and acknowledgement to:
· Variety September 13, 2013 (reprinted at the end of this blog) · Wall Street Journal, September 5, 2013 · The Hollywood Reporter September 28, 2011
Aside from major director Ron Howard himself, the second “major” element of the film is that Universal is the North American distributor of the film. This happens through the three year minimum-6-picture distribution deal Brian Oliver’s Cross Creek has with Universal in which Cross Creek produces and finances either its own films or films chosen from Universal’s development slate. Cross Creek is set up to generate up to four films per year, with Universal to distribute at least two of them with a wide-release commitment.
Isa (International Sales Agent) Exclusive Media is also an independent. This too is the result of Oliver’s deal with Exclusive to jointly finance two projects per year.
Cross Creek, putting its own cash into the project, split the cost of the picture with Exclusive who financed it through a bank loan made against pre-sales generated in 2011 at the Afm. With Howard there to promote the project to buyers, Exclusive secured around $33 million in foreign pre-sales. See Cinando’s list of distributors .
Additionally, Oliver and Eaton structured the project as a U.K.- German co-production, enabling them to secure about $12 million in soft money from Germany (Egoli Tossell) in accordance with U.K.’s co-production treaty. As a result, U.K. rights ended up with Studiocanal.
Brian Oliver is a “one of Hollywood’s biggest and more unusual financiers of risky films, with coin coming mostly from oil and real estate investments in Texas”. This major Hollywood financier/ producer takes chances which prove his astute, if askew, view of what makes a “Hollywood” picture an indie at the same time, as shown by his credits, The Ides of March and Black Swan.
Andrew Eaton is a British producer with deep Hollywood connections through the British community here, e.g., Eric Fellner of Working Title, the British production company currently owned by Universal. (Parenthetically, I bought U.S. rights to Working Title’s first film, My Beautiful Laundrette for Lorimar along with Orion Classics and so I was quite thrilled to have a chance to be in touch with the talented Brits once again).
Working Title had worked with Andrew Easton on Frost/Nixon. Eric Fellner loved the script and offered it to Universal for funding. However, as said, Universal passed on it because it was too small.
“It is going to be easy for people to think this is a Hollywood movie, and it just is not,” quotes Variety from the film’s British screenwriter, Peter Morgan, who penned Frost/Nixon which was also directed by Howard. “It is a British independent film directed by a Hollywood director.”
Eaton and Oliver spoke of how they put this film together.
“We must champion the fact that this is basically 80% a British film in terms of the people who worked on it, the way it was structured and the way we ran it,” says Eaton, who was behind such indie films as 24 Hour Party People and the Red Riding TV series.
Can a Song Save Your Life? (U.S. UTA, Isa: Exclusive)
Exclusive has another film here, Can a Song Save Your Life? which is also repped by Rena Ronson, Co-Head of the Independent Film Group of UTA. Directed by John Carney who came to the public’s attention with his micro-budgeted Once which plays on stage here in Toronto at the moment, in New York and elsewhere regularly. The Weinstein Company picked it up in Toronto, reportedly paying around a $7 million minimum guarantee for U.S. rights with a P&A commitment of at least $20 million.
UTA as an agency also packages both large (studio) and smaller indie films. Rena Ronson, the co-head of UTA Indie explained how her own indie roots -- first at indie distributor Fox-Lorber and continuing into international sales before becoming the “indie agent” at Wma, succeeding the “indie” founder, Bobbi Thompson, have taught her to speak the language of the international as well as the independent film business. She knows the major modes of operating as well as she knows the independent style of business. She further explained that the successes of the larger films permit the “smaller”, i.e., “indie” films to be made.
UTA repped films in Toronto are listed below. For a full report of rights sold, before, during and after Toronto, watch SydneysBuzz.com for the Fall 2013 Rights Roundup.
Can A Song Save Your Life?
Writer/Director: John Carney Starring: Mark Ruffalo, Keira Knightley, Hailee Steinfeld, Adam Levine, Catherine Keener, Mos Def, Cee-Lo Green Publicity: Falco / Shannon Treusch, Monica Delameter U.S. Producer Rep: UTA / CAA . Isa: Exclusive Media Group
U.S. rights were acquired at Tiff 13 by TWC for a record breaking $7 million.
Since first announcing it in Cannes 2012, Exclusive has made other deals as well for Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan (Tanweer), Germany (Studiocanal), Japan (Pony Canyon Inc), Philippines (Solar Entertainment), Russia (A Company), So. Korea ( Pancinema), Switzerland ( Ascot Elite Entertainment Group ), Taiwan ( Serenity Entertainment International ), Turkey (D Productions), the Middle East ( Front Row Filmed Entertainment).
Tiff Special Presentations:
Hateship, Loveship
Director: Liza Johnson Writer: Mark Poirier Writer (Novel): Alice Munro Starring: Kristen Wiig, Guy Pearce, Hailee Steinfeld, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Nick Nolte Publicity: Prodigy PR, Erik Bright
North American Sale: UTA / Cassian Elwes. Isa: The Weinstein Co. Sena has rights for Iceland.
The F Word
Director: Michael Dowse Writer: Elan Mastai Writers (Play): Michael Rinaldi & T.J. Dawe Starring: Daniel Radcliffe, Zoe Kazan, Rafe Spall, Adam Driver, Mackenzie Davis, Amanda Crew Publicity: Strategy PR / Cynthia Schwartz, Michael Kupferberg Us Sale: UTA / Lichter, Grossman, Nichols, Adler & Feldman. Isa: eOne
After UTA sold the The F Word to CBS Films for the U.S. for around $3 million in Toronto, Entertainment One Films International completed other international sales. Besides Canada and the U.K., eOne itself will release the film in Australia/New Zealand, Benelux and Spain feeding its own international distribution pipeline. Other sales include Germany to Senator Entertainment, Middle East to Front Row Entertainment, Nigeria toRed Mist, Russia to Carmen Film Group, Turkey to Mars Entertainment Group
Night Moves
Writer/Director: Kelly Reichart Writer: Jonathan Raymond Starring: Dakota Fanning, Jesse Eisenberg, Peter Sarsgaard, Alia Shawkat Publicity: Ginsberg/Libby, Chris Libby North American Sale: UTA Isa: The Match Factory
Tiff Vanguard
The Sacrament
Writer/Director: Ti West Starring: Joe Swanberg, Aj Bowen, Amy Seimetz, Kate Lyn Sheil, Gene Jones Publicity: Dda, Dana Archer, Alice Zhou North American Sale: UTA / CAA Isa: Im Global sold to Pegasus Motion Pictures Distribution Ltd . For China
As of this writing, rather 1 hour ago, Magnolia Pictures, which lost on an earlier bidding war here for Joe, is finalizing a deal for the picture reportedly for seven figures.
Coincidentallywith the beginning of the Toronto Film Festival, the front page of L.A. Times quoted Rena Ronson in an article called "Making history as cameras roll" (print edition) or "Wadjda' director makes her mark in Saudi cinema" (online edition) about Wadjda , (Isa: The Match Factory) last year’s Venice and Telluride film which Rena had spotted at the Abu Dhabi Film Festival, where it won a script award. It was written and directed by a woman which is notable in such a male-dominated part of the world. She met the writer-director, Haifaa Mansour, and that led to working with her for the next two years to finance the film. Its $2.5m budget was backed in part by the Rotana Group, the largest media company in the Middle East, owned primarily by Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal. The German production company Razor Film owned and operated by Gerhard Meixner and Roman Paul whose first coproduction in 2005, Paradise Now brought them into international prominence and who also picked up last year’s Tiff groundbreaking film from Afghanistan,The Patience Stone, and previously coproduced Waltz With Bashir, came on board and brought German broadcast deals and German film funds as well.
Doha and Film Financing
The fourth panelist was Paul Miller, Head of Film Financing, from the Doha Film Institute , Qatar's first international organization dedicated to film financing, production, education and two film festivals. Doha encourages submission for financing film financing opportunities from anywhere in the world. The Dfi Grants program supports first- and second-time filmmakers in producing and developing their own stories. There are two funding rounds per year. Applications are considered from three regions (basically divided into the Middle East, developing nations and the rest of the world – with some exceptions -- each with different eligibility criteria.
Consideration for funding is open to feature-length films in development, production and post-production, as well as short films in production and post-production. Since 2010, Dfi has provided funding to more than 138 filmmakers.
Beyond the regional grants program, Dfi also invests in a diverse slate of international productions to encourage greater collaboration, mentorship and co‑production opportunities between Gulf countries and the rest of the world. Co-financing applications apply to both Middle Eastern and international feature films, television and web series. Submissions are accepted on a rolling basis throughout the year.
Four films at Tiff that Doha has helped finance:
Mohammed Malas’s Ladder to Damacus, screening in Tiff’s Contemporary World Cinema section; Jasmila Žbanic’s For Those Who Can Tell No Tales in the Special Presentation section. Both films were co-financed by Dfi. Dfi grant recipients Néjib Belkadhi’s Bastardo and Mais Darwazah’s My Love Awaits Me by the Sea screening in the Contemporary World Cinema and Discovery sections, respectively.
The fifth panelist, Ted Hope, Director of the San Francisco Film Society, a non-profit training, festival, and funding operation is known to everyone from his history with Good Machine (which was acquired by Universal and renamed Focus Features), and from his blog Hope for Film/ Truly Free Film . In his always-inimitable fashion, Ted proposed a new sort of financing, called "staged financing", based on a progressive meeting of certain criterion from development through distribution. This way of financing is similar to the venture capital models of financing. His broad ideas on what has to change with the industry's funding and packaging methods brought the panelists and the audience to heel at attention. I reprint his blog after this because this idea goes against the current grain of financing an entire film which may or may not prove to be the final box office bingo winner it always purports to be when securing full financing.
The Sffs provided some funding to Thomas Oliver's 1982 which is in Tiff this year. Aside from winning Us in Progress’ $60,000 in post-production services at this year’s Champs Elysees Film Festival, 1982 also received Sffs’s $85,000 post production grant and participated in the Sffs’s A2E labs. The film is being represented by Kevin Iwashina’s Preferred Content.
The panel became very animated as Ted Hope and Rena Ronson faced off about whether a film is made for a broad audience or whether, if targeted correctly, it could actually make money with niche audiences. As always, the two of them, both equally astute, brought much to bear on both sides of the argument. And, I, as the panel’s moderator, hereby declare, They are both right.
The broader the audience the more potential for making money.
However, as Ted points out, with crowd sourcing, crowd funding and crowd theatrical exhibition, there are many other ways beyond ticket purchases that filmmakers can offer in order to make money with their targeted audience.
This, as well as the great contributions made by Doha’s Paul Miller and Revolution’s Andrew Eaton could have extended the panel into a full day. Paul Oliver of Cross Creek was the quietest, perhaps most reticent, of the speakers, but he amply demonstrated that he is one who puts his money where his mouth is. His acumen and taste make us all grateful for his existence as he is a pivotal point person in creating works of art that create substantial revenues for a sustainable art house film business.
The audience as well was most enthusiastic with their questions and post panel discussions with panelists who stayed to talk.
Articles Reprinted Here:
Truly Free Film
Staged Financing Must Become Film Biz’s Immediate Goal
Posted: 06 Sep 2013 05:15 Am Pdt
Each day I become more and more convinced that staged financing could be a cure to much of the Film Biz’s ills. Staged financing? What? Is the phrase not exactly center of your conversations right now? Why not?!! Whatsamattawidyou? Don’t you know a good solution when you see one?
Although it already exists in many fields, and even in a few small patches of our own yard, I recognize that a staged financing strategy is not yet the force behind Indieland’s own gardening. I am however growing convinced it could yield a far more fruitful harvest than our current methods. A staged-financing ecosystem can’t be built in a one-off manner though. Although it also does not need to the rule of the realm, it needs a permanent eco-system to support it.
Staged financing is part of a much bigger solution that we urgently need to bring to our industry: a sustainable investor class . We need smart money and need to stop seeking, encouraging, and propagating dumb money. Most film investors get out, win or lose, by their third film (I have been told this and don’t have the stats to back it up now, but if you do, please share — otherwise just trust that is what my experience has shown). The value of most independent money in the film biz is the money itself, and that is not good for anyone.
Staged financing is exactly what it says to be. I know in this world such literalness is a strange thing, but there is it. Staged financing is a funding process that is there for each distinct stage. In comparison, it is the opposite of up-front financing — the type that monopolizes the narrative feature world. I am proposing that we institutionalize the staged-financing process and make it easier to finance your film in drips and drabs. Why am I so bullish on what probably sounds like hell to many? Why do I think it will save indie film? Let’s count the ways.
Staged financing increases the predictability of success. Investors can base their continued commitment on a proof of prinicipal instead of just a pitch. The longer one waits the more they know — of course the longer one waits the lower the chance for their to be the opportunity for investment, so there. The more investors can project or even predict their success, the longer they will stay in the game, and the more that will gather to pay — i.e. more capital at play! Staged financing allows filmmakers and their supporters to pivot based on real world data. The old way had very little it could do when new information hit. Your film (and investment) could be rendered obsolete over night. But that does not have to be a done deal is this new world. This is just one of the many reasons for #1 above of course. Staged financing diversifies the creative class. Wouldn’t it be great if the film biz was actually a meritocracy? Well, if people had to make good movies to complete their financing, wouldn’t that be a bit closer to the case? Staged financing gives all people the opportunity to prove they have a good idea, whether that idea is completed or not. It is not about who you know, but about what you’ve done and can do. Documentary film — compared to the narrative world — already has a great deal of staged financing institutionalized — and benefits from gender proportional representation among directors. Need I say more?Staged financing allows ambitious artistic work to flourish. Instead of just having “commercial elements”, unique and inspiring work can be recognized for the potential it truly has. Instead of being rewarded for being able to earn trust or arrogantly claim to know what one is doing, staged financing allows good work to be rewarded for being good work. Currently, we mistake confidence for capability and those that boast to be able to predict what the end product will be (where there is no way that they will actually know what the 100+ decisions each day will yield), get to play — not the work that delivers something new and wonderful. Staged financing rewards quality over risk mitigation. Staged financing is actually a better form of risk mitigation than the present form that is only based on regurgitating what has already proven successful. When we limit risk by mimicking what has worked in the past, all we are doing is guessing and covering our ass — and this leads to a film culture of movie titles overrun with numerals. We live in an era of abundance, and as comforting as the familiar may be, we have more access to it than ever before. We rarely need the new version of it. We will however need truly original work more and more as time goes on as we will drowning in the repetitive. How will we prove what works? Staged financing, my friend, staged financing. Staged financing creates a better project as it incentivizes the creators every step of the way. Not that you truly need to incentivize those that are in the passion industries for the right reason, but it never hurts to weed out those that are in it for the wrong reason. When your financing is based on your work and not your connections or investors’ fears, you will do all you can to make each stage of financing shine, justify itself, and be truly competitive. Staged financing requires you to walk a series of steps, proving you have earned the right with every advance — and you better do your homework if you don’t want to get left behind. Staged financing requires you choose your initial partners wisely. It’s not just about the terms of the deal that should determine whom your investors are — but that is how we generally act nowadays. Everyone should instead seek value-add investors. You should get more than just money from your investors. You should benefit from their expertise. Filmmakers, agents, lawyers, and managers, often are willing to leap into bed with anyone who offers the most cash — there’s a name for that practice and it should not be film investment. Staged financing means the creators will have “skin in the game”. When it is an up-front finance model, the creators are not working for a payout in success but working just for the upfornt fees (or some semblance thereof); they may have “profit participation” but basically the only anticipated earnings are what is in the budget. It becomes increasingly difficult to motivate the creative team to be engaged in the needed work after the film premieres. Investors have long recognized that this is not the most beneficial arrangement, yet what can they do? The answer my friend, is… yup, you know the song I am singing: everyone loves that staged financing! Staged financing is a time-tested process that has already been adopted by many industries . Staged financing is the modus operandi of Silicon Valley and all the Vc firms. Other industries, from mining onwards, have seen real benefits from the process. Why do we limit our success and not apply proven models to our field? Could it be that somewhere someone is desperately clutching on to what ever paltry power they perceive themselves to possess? Hmmm… If they don’t offer the model you want at the store, build a new model — or maybe even a chain of stores. Staged financing gives producers of quality work more power. The main objection to staged financing is that it gives financiers more power. That is only true if you are making crap. Or mediocre work. If you are making something wonderfully astounding you will never struggle to progress to the next round — and in fact you will be able to improve your terms. And investors won’t complain either, because they now can have to know a good thing when they see one.
So if Staged Financing is this marvelous thing, why have our leaders not yet delivered it to you? Well, they don’t care about you; didn’t you know that?
And if Staged Financing could really save Indie Film, why has the community not constructed this marvelous ecosystem yet? Well, we’ve all been too busy chasing shiny objects and marveling at the reflections fed back of us.
But change is here. We have hope. We can build it better together. And I have already started. The San Francisco Film Society is committed to it. We have others who want to be part of. We are have spots for more to join in. And we are going to help a few select projects really rock this world.
Watch this space. Let’s do it together and truly astonish the world with your awe inspiring work. Just don’t be slack, okay?
Variety, August 21, 2013:
“Rush,” the high-octane car racing film about the public rivalry between legendary Formula One drivers Niki Lauda and James Hunt during the 1970s, has all the markings of tinseltown’s latest flashy biopic, withRon Howard at the wheel, Chris Hemsworth as its star, and Universal Pictures releasing the film Sept. 27. But that assumption couldn’t be further from the truth.
“It is going to be easy for people to think this is a Hollywood movie, and it just is not,” says the upcoming film’s British screenwriter, Peter Morgan, who penned “Frost/Nixon,” also directed by Howard. “It is a British independent film directed by a Hollywood director.” Get Weekly Online News and alerts free to your inbox
As the majors focus more on putting their money behind mega-budgeted projects with built-in brand awareness — sequels, reboots, films based on toys, videogames and comicbooks — filmmakers are finding Hollywood’s studio system rapidly shifting under their feet.
“Because studios are less interested in the midbudget area, there is a massive opportunity for independents to step into that (area) at the moment,” says “Rush” producer Andrew Eaton of London-based Revolution Films.
Indeed, it’s getting harder to set up a midbudget range original project at a studio, even for veteran filmmakers like Howard and his producing partner Brian Grazer, whose Imagine Entertainment has had an overall deal at Universal for 27 years (the longest standing deal U has had in its 100-year history with a production company). That’s forced directors to look elsewhere to tackle the kinds of films now considered too risky to make or the ones that won’t fill retail shelves with merchandise.
Another Hollywood vet, producer Marc Platt, who’s had a production deal at Universal since 1998 after stepping down as its production head, similarly had to find indie financing for his film “2 Guns” after Universal said it would not bankroll the picture but simply distribute it.
With “Rush,” Howard found himself in an entirely new role as the director of a $50 million film that was his first to be independently financed — through a series of bonds, contingencies and pre-sales. He also was a director for hire, replacing Paul Greengrass, who was originally set to bring the showy personalities of Hunt (Hemsworth), a British playboy; and the more serious Austrian champion Lauda (Daniel Bruhl) to the big screen.
“We must champion the fact that this is basically 80% a British film in terms of the people who worked on it, the way it was structured and the way we ran it,” says Eaton. The exec, who was behind such indie films as “24 Hour Party People” and the “Red Riding” series, is modest, and like most Brits politely shies away from the spotlight, tending not to grab credit even when its due.
But he believes “Rush” shows off Blighty’s mettle.
“These are the kinds of films we should be making in the U.K. because we can do it, and we can do it for better value of money,” he says.
Morgan began writing the story of Lauda, a friend of his wife’s, on spec some years ago, intrigued by the driver’s courageous comeback just 40 days after a devastating crash at the 1976 German Grand Prix that severely burned his face and saw him lapse into a coma, and how that might play against Hunt’s notorious womanizing and party lifestyle that gained him rock-star status.
Eager to work with Eaton again after Fernando Meirelles’ “360,” Morgan showed the producer the first draft of “Rush,” and Eaton was hooked.
“Andrew was always going to be a great fit for this project,” Morgan says. “If (the) responsibility was to make this at a price, Andrew could do this. He could make a $50 million film feel like a $150 million film.”
With Greengrass, another Brit, attached to direct, Morgan showed the script to close friend Eric Fellner at his Universal-owned British production outfit Working Title. Fellner, who had worked with him on “Frost/Nixon,” loved the new script and offered it to Universal for funding.
But the studio passed, considering it risky subject matter, given the biopic elements and low profile of F1 racing in the U.S. Universal also didn’t believe the film could be made for the right price. Still Fellner stayed onboard, and his contacts in the F1 arena proved invaluable. His relationships with Ferrari and McLaren thanks to his work on documentary “Senna” enabled “Rush” to enlist the brands in the pic without losing editorial control.
“Ron (Howard) jokes that my major contribution was engine noise,” Fellner says. “Maybe I can take credit for a bit of that.”
Soon after Universal passed, Cross Creek Pictures topper Brian Oliver reached out to Eaton to finance the project — so eager that he offered to put up $2 million before he even signed the deal so that Eaton could order replicas of the 1970s cars to be ready in time for the shoot. He also was instrumental in steering Hemsworth toward the project.
“Typically we don’t spend that kind of money without knowing the movie is going and the budget is done,” Oliver says. “But I was passionate about the script, and I really thought it was a film with a lot of heart, not just a race car movie.”
Cross Creek, also behind “The Ides of March” and “Black Swan,” has quickly become one of Hollywood’s biggest and more unusual financiers of risky films, with coin coming mostly from oil and real estate investments in Texas.
“He’s an unusual maverick in Hollywood because he really fought to get the budget to the highest level he could,” says Eaton of Oliver. “There’s no bullshit with him — he gets stuff done.” Adds Fellner: “Without Brian, the film wouldn’t have gotten off of the ground. He put his money where his mouth is.”
Shortly after funding started coming together, Greengrass dropped off the project due, ironically, to his issues with the budget. Within 24 hours, Morgan and Fellner enticed Howard to come onboard. The financing arrangement intrigued him, but what really attracted Howard was the ability to re-create the world of Formula One in the 1970s “when sex was safe and driving was dangerous,” as he has said in past interviews.
“Ron was incredibly gracious in trusting us to deliver,” Eaton says. “He was very smart about knowing we needed to make this film in a different way. He’d never made a film with a bond before, and never made a film with a contingency before, but he rolled up his sleeves and was ready to learn.” Some of that indie spirit has already rubbed off on Howard, who is now sticking with a mostly British crew on his next project, “In the Heart of the Sea,” including “Rush” cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle and costume designer Julian Day. “Heart” lenses in London.
Exclusive Media came in as the final partner on “Rush,” brought in by Oliver under his deal with Exclusive to jointly finance two projects per year.
Cross Creek split the cost of the pic with Exclusive, with the former putting its own cash in to the pic and the latter financing through a bank loan made against pre-sales generated in 2011 at the Afm, where Howard helped shop the project to buyers. The move proved a success, as Exclusive secured $33 million in foreign pre-sales.
Additionally, Oliver and Eaton structured the project as a U.K.-German co-production, enabling them to secure about $12 million in soft money.
As a result, U.K. rights ended up going to Studiocanal. Universal agreed to distribute “Rush” in the U.S. through its output deal with Cross Creek.
Eaton pressed to put all of the money raised on the screen. “Rush” became the highest-budget film he had ever worked with after 2000’s “The Claim,” which cost $18 million to produce.
“(‘Rush’) was financed in exactly the same way we finance every independent film, and we approached shooting in the same way as we do everything — you try to put as much money as you can onscreen,” Eaton says. “It’s about not wasting money on things you don’t need, like private jets and extravagances.”
Hollywood has tried to bring to life the world of Formula One before.
Sylvester Stallone directed “Driven,” which originally was set in the world of F1, before he changed course and based it on rival Cart racing, instead.
The reason? To gain access to F1, filmmakers must first get the greenlight from the often polarizing Bernie Ecclestone, the 82-year-old billionaire who holds a tight grip on the racing league that has long counted the elite as fans, including Carlos Slim, the world’s richest man, and celebs including Michael Fassbender, Patrick Dempsey, Gordon Ramsey, George Lucas, and Cirque de Soleil founder Guy Laliberte.
Although Stallone tried to gain Ecclestone’s approval, “I apologize to fans of Formula 1, but there is a certain individual there who runs the sport that has his own agenda,” Stallone said in 2000. “F1 is very formal, and it’s very hard to get to know people.”
David Cronenberg also planned to direct a tentpole around F1 for Paramount, in 1986, with the director scouting the project by attending Grand Prix races in Australia and Mexico. The film, “Red Cars,” would have revolved around American driver Phil Hill winning the world championship for Ferrari in 1961. Plans were shelved when Ecclestone decided not to support the project. Instead, Cronenberg published a limited edition art book based on the screenplay in 2005.
One of the few cinematic standouts so far is Asif Kapadia’s documentary “Senna,” about the charismatic Brazilian driver Ayrton Senna, killed in a race in 1994 that’s show in the docu. “Senna” went on to earn $8.2 million, and helped educate viewers of the sport by focusing not on the races but Senna’s iconic presence and his impact on pop culture.
“Rush” is looking to put a spotlight on the personalities behind the wheel and the often riveting rivalries between drivers — what many consider the real draw to the sport. Bruhl has compared them to “modern knights constantly facing death.”
As the film races toward its September release — it will be shown at the Toronto Film Festival out of competition — Howard has screened it for not only racing fans but Formula One, itself.
He recently showed the film to a group of F1 drivers (including Lauda, Lewis Hamilton, Nico Rosberg and Felipe Massa) at Germany’s Grand Prix, calling that audience the toughest test so far, and comparing the experience to screening “Apollo 13” to Nasa’s astronauts and mission controllers in 1995.
In his efforts to promote the film, Howard has called the Hunt-Lauda rivalry one of the greatest in all of sports. “Their story is so remarkable, you (could) only do it if it was true, because people wouldn’t quite believe it. They were willing to risk their lives to attain this elite status. They paid a price for it, but they defined themselves.”
Morgan also has been doing his part to reassure F1 fans that the film is authentic, stressing that it’s about the people in the cars, and not the sport itself.
Any way the wheel’s spun, it’s clear the film’s overall success will largely be driven by how it plays overseas. “Rush” will need to appeal to an international audience that’s more familiar with F1 — a sport second in popularity only to soccer — than to those in the U.S.
But Howard needs to hook moviegoers closer to home — making the American director’s job a much tougher sell.
It’s not really that surprising that there’s nothing all that American about “Rush.”
Formula One is still struggling to find an audience in the U.S. It’s looking to change that through a new $3 million broadcasting deal with NBC Sports that airs 13 races on the cable channel, two on CNBC, and four on NBC. The Monaco Grand Prix was the first of four F1 races to air live on NBC this year, with the final race taking place Nov. 24 from Brazil.
Ratings have averaged a 0.3 rating, although the Monaco race was watched by 1.5 million viewers, making it the most-watched Formula One race on U.S. television in six years, and up 40% over last year’s race when it aired on Speed TV, Nielsen said.
Promos have emphasized the speed of F1’s jetfighter cars, its international appeal and Olympics-like profiles of the drivers.
Formula One also is looking to rev up new fans in the U.S. through the opening of its first permanent track in Austin, Texas, last year, known as the Circuit of the Americas. Howard attended its first race, where Lauda also roamed the track’s garages.
What’s ironic is that Howard isn’t a very good driver. He proved that recently racing around the track of BBC’s hit show “Top Gear” to promote “Rush,” ending up in second to last place on the series’ celebrity leader board — behind Genesis’ Mike Rutherford.
Host Jeremy Clarkson was quick to mock him, saying “We finally found something you can’t do. Good at directing, brilliant in ‘Happy Days,’ a charming human being — but utterly crap at driving.”
Ron Howard's Risky Formula One Movie, 'Rush'
Can this Euro-centric car racing film play in the U.S.?
By Rachel Dodes Conn
Ron Howard's films, like "Apollo 13" and "Frost/Nixon," typically deal with issues very familiar to American audiences. His latest project, Mr. Howard's first independently financed film, is a bit of a departure: "Rush" chronicles the rivalry between Austrian Formula One racer Niki Lauda and his nemesis, the British driver James Hunt, over the course of the historic 1976 season. While competing in Nürburg, Germany during treacherous weather conditions, Mr. Lauda (Daniel Brühl, right) crashed his Ferrari and sustained severe burns to his face and lungs. Yet, fueled by a desire to beat Mr. Hunt (Chris Hemsworth, above), a playboy type whose wife (Olivia Wilde) ran off with Richard Burton, Mr. Lauda was back in his car just six weeks later—still wearing his bandages—to race against him in the Italian Grand Prix.
When Mr. Howard received the script on spec from screenwriter Peter Morgan ("Frost/Nixon," "The Last King of Scotland"), he wasn't a Formula One fan and didn't know who Messrs. Hunt and Lauda were. "I looked them up on Wikipedia," he admits. But as he read about the racers' personalities, he started to see broader themes that would appeal to U.S. moviegoers. "Maybe this is the American in me identifying this," he says, "but both these guys are utterly and entirely individuals—there was no Yoda telling them to seek their higher self."
For Mr. Howard, the process of researching "Rush" was surprisingly similar to learning about space travel for his "Apollo 13," because he found himself having to make arcane automotive engineering terms accessible to viewers. "It was really fun to understand a sport that combines cutting-edge technology with very dangerous competition," he says. "The visceral, cool and sexy element offered a kind of cinematic experience that nowadays exists only with sci-fi."
Formula One isn't nearly as popular in the U.S. as Nascar, and the subject matter is likelier to play well overseas, where the film's financing came from. It premiered Monday, in London, a few weeks before its U.S. opening. The filmmakers say it's more than just a sports picture, and they expect it to appeal to women as well as men.
Saudi Female Filmmaker Succeeds In Making A Movie About A Girl Who Wants A Bicycle
Los Angeles Times
By Rebecca Keegan
Sept. 6, 2013
In a country where women can't freely move around, Haifaa Mansour covertly films the story of a girl's quest for a bicycle.
The production lost two days to sandstorms. The crew faced a last-minute scramble when the nervous owner of a mall changed his mind about allowing filming there. Some days locals chased the cameras away; other days they brought platters of lamb and rice to the set, and asked to be extras.
Meanwhile, the director hid in a van, speaking to her cast via walkie-talkie. In Saudi Arabia, where driving a car is a subversive act for a woman, a 39-year-old mother of two has done something remarkable: written and directed what her distributor believes is the first feature film shot entirely in the ultraconservative kingdom.
Haifaa Mansour is the director of "Wadjda," a drama about a plucky 10-year-old girl who enrolls in a Koran recitation competition in order to win money for a bicycle she's forbidden by law to ride.
Like her young protagonist, Mansour's own story is one of feminine moxie.
In a sly protest of the country's ban on women behind the wheel, she drove herself to her wedding in a golf cart. Because women in Saudi Arabia can't mingle publicly with men outside their families, she shot her movie covertly on the streets of the capital, Riyadh. With movie theaters banned, she screened "Wadjda" in two foreign embassies and a cultural center.
Petite, self-assured, wearing white high-tops and blue nail polish, Mansour is modern in both her fashion and bearing. She speaks English quickly and colloquially, dropping frequent "you knows" into conversation. And she isn't afraid to counter misperceptions about her homeland, as when she gently corrected Bill Maher for calling Mecca the Saudi capital during a recent appearance on his HBO show.
Laced with empathy and humor, "Wadjda" is a quietly provocative portrait of a culture that straddles the centuries, where men wear the ancient white thobe but carry the latest iPads and women hold important jobs as doctors and news anchors but have yet to vote in an election.
"I didn't want to make a movie about women being raped or stoned," Mansour said in an interview in Beverly Hills in June. "For me it is the everyday life, how it's hard. For me, it was hard sometimes to go to work because I cannot find transportation. Things like that build up and break a woman."
The eighth of 12 children of a poet, Mansour grew up in a small town in a home that she describes as nurturing for a little girl.
"My family is very traditional, but my parents are very supportive, very kind," she said. "I never felt I can't do things because I'm a woman."
When Mansour was a teen, her mother removed the light veil she wore while picking her daughter up from school, a gesture that mortified the young woman at the time, but empowers her when she reflects on it now.
Though movie theaters have been shuttered in Saudi Arabia for decades for religious reasons, Mansour said her father, like others, often rented VHS tapes at Blockbuster for the family to watch -- she grew up on Jackie Chan movies, Bollywood productions, Egyptian cinema and Disney animated films. "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" was a particular favorite.
"In small-town Saudi, there is nothing to do. You don't get to exercise your emotions because nothing much is happening, you know?" she said. "So to see people falling in love and fighting, it's so powerful, you see beyond your small town."
After earning her bachelor's degree in comparative literature at the American University in Cairo, she returned to Saudi Arabia but quickly felt stymied.
"Going back to Saudi as a young woman, trying to assert yourself in the workplace, you have all those ideas … and all of a sudden you realize because you are a woman you are not heard," she said. "It was such a frustrating moment in my life. It was as if you are screaming in a vacuum."
The idea of women holding jobs still unnerves some Saudi men -- writer Abdullah Mohammed Daoud recently encouraged his more than 97,000 Twitter followers to sexually harass female grocery store clerks to intimidate women from working.
Recalling the freedom she found in movies, Mansour decided to make a short film with her siblings serving as cast and crew, a thriller about a male serial killer who hides under the black abaya worn by Muslim women. Her work -- two more shorts, a documentary and a stint hosting a talk show for a Lebanese network -- focused largely on the untold stories of Saudi women.
In 2005, at a U.S. embassy screening of her documentary, "Women Without Shadows," Mansour met her future husband, American diplomat Bradley Neimann. They now have two children, 2 and 5, and live in Bahrain, where Neimann works for the State Department.
When her husband was posted in Australia, Mansour pursued a master's in film studies at the University of Sydney, and wrote the script that became "Wadjda."
The story was inspired by her now teenage niece, who has tamped down her rambunctious personality to fit into Saudi norms.
"I thought, 'Wow, a woman writer from Saudi Arabia won?'" Rena Ronson said. "I had to meet her. She was so open and tenacious and smart."When Mansour's script for "Wadjda" won an award at the Abu Dhabi Film Festival, it caught the eye of the co-head of the independent film group at United Talent Agency.
Over the next two years Ronson helped Mansour secure financing for her film, which cost a little less than $2.5 million. The primary obstacle, as far as many potential Middle Eastern producers were concerned, was Mansour's desire to shoot in Saudi Arabia, which she felt lent her story authenticity.
The production finally won the tacit approval of the Saudi government -- one of its backers is Rotana Group, an entertainment company primarily owned by Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal. Another major financier is the German company Razor Film.
Finding actors was another hurdle. Mansour and her producers recruited child performers through small companies that hire folkloric dancers for the Eid holidays. Many of their parents were uncomfortable with a movie about empowering women.
A week before she was scheduled to start shooting, Mansour still hadn't cast her title character when 12-year-old Waad Mohammed entered the room in blue jeans, with headphones clapped over her ears. Singing along to Justin Bieber, she won over Mansour with her sweet singing voice and tomboyish style.
The movie's half-German, half-Saudi crew worked around the rhythms of Saudi life, using cellphone apps that alerted them of the five daily prayer calls. The Germans carried notebooks; the Saudis relied on oral planning.
On the first day of shooting, a start time of 7:20 a.m. came and went. "I don't know what we were thinking," said German producer Roman Paul. "I don't think 7:20 exists in Saudi time. We Germans learned to relax, and the Saudis learned that there is a benefit to doing things at a certain time."
Despite tension on the set -- both from disapproving observers and from the German and Saudi crews learning to work together -- Mansour was buoyant, Paul said.
"She's very fast in overcoming new difficulties, and in an upbeat spirit," Paul said.
Last summer "Wadjda" premiered at the Venice and Telluride film festivals, earning praise for Mansour's subtle direction and a U.S. release from Sony Pictures Classics, which handled the Oscar-winning 2011 Iranian drama "A Separation," about the dissolution of a marriage.
"'A Separation' was such an eye-opener to me in the sense that there were people questioning whether the film went too specific into the Iranian culture," said Michael Barker, co-president and co-founder of the Sony unit. "But if the overall story has a universal appeal, in 'Wadjda' it's about parents and kids and restrictions and freedom, that's something we can all relate to."
Sony Classics has been showing the film to noted feminists -- Gloria Steinem and Queen Noor of Jordan both attended screenings -- and will release it in the U.S. slowly over the fall, starting Sept. 13. (The movie premiered in multiple European countries this summer.)
Mansour said she plans to work in Saudi Arabia again. For her, screening her movie in the kingdom was a high.
"Film is about uplifting, embracing the love of life, it's about moving ahead, it's about victory," she said. "It's not about defeat."
One victory has already been won. This spring, a new law went into effect: With some restrictions, Saudi women are now allowed to ride bicycles.
Rush (U.S. Universal, International Sales by Exclusive)
Ron Howard and his producing partner Brian Grazer whose imagine Entertainment have had an overall deal at Universal for 27 years, however, this mid-budget range film of some $50,000,000 was considered not "big enough" for the majors.
To read more about this complex and fascinating film and its international film business background, read the following articles which are quoted throughout this article with thanks and acknowledgement to:
· Variety September 13, 2013 (reprinted at the end of this blog) · Wall Street Journal, September 5, 2013 · The Hollywood Reporter September 28, 2011
Aside from major director Ron Howard himself, the second “major” element of the film is that Universal is the North American distributor of the film. This happens through the three year minimum-6-picture distribution deal Brian Oliver’s Cross Creek has with Universal in which Cross Creek produces and finances either its own films or films chosen from Universal’s development slate. Cross Creek is set up to generate up to four films per year, with Universal to distribute at least two of them with a wide-release commitment.
Isa (International Sales Agent) Exclusive Media is also an independent. This too is the result of Oliver’s deal with Exclusive to jointly finance two projects per year.
Cross Creek, putting its own cash into the project, split the cost of the picture with Exclusive who financed it through a bank loan made against pre-sales generated in 2011 at the Afm. With Howard there to promote the project to buyers, Exclusive secured around $33 million in foreign pre-sales. See Cinando’s list of distributors .
Additionally, Oliver and Eaton structured the project as a U.K.- German co-production, enabling them to secure about $12 million in soft money from Germany (Egoli Tossell) in accordance with U.K.’s co-production treaty. As a result, U.K. rights ended up with Studiocanal.
Brian Oliver is a “one of Hollywood’s biggest and more unusual financiers of risky films, with coin coming mostly from oil and real estate investments in Texas”. This major Hollywood financier/ producer takes chances which prove his astute, if askew, view of what makes a “Hollywood” picture an indie at the same time, as shown by his credits, The Ides of March and Black Swan.
Andrew Eaton is a British producer with deep Hollywood connections through the British community here, e.g., Eric Fellner of Working Title, the British production company currently owned by Universal. (Parenthetically, I bought U.S. rights to Working Title’s first film, My Beautiful Laundrette for Lorimar along with Orion Classics and so I was quite thrilled to have a chance to be in touch with the talented Brits once again).
Working Title had worked with Andrew Easton on Frost/Nixon. Eric Fellner loved the script and offered it to Universal for funding. However, as said, Universal passed on it because it was too small.
“It is going to be easy for people to think this is a Hollywood movie, and it just is not,” quotes Variety from the film’s British screenwriter, Peter Morgan, who penned Frost/Nixon which was also directed by Howard. “It is a British independent film directed by a Hollywood director.”
Eaton and Oliver spoke of how they put this film together.
“We must champion the fact that this is basically 80% a British film in terms of the people who worked on it, the way it was structured and the way we ran it,” says Eaton, who was behind such indie films as 24 Hour Party People and the Red Riding TV series.
Can a Song Save Your Life? (U.S. UTA, Isa: Exclusive)
Exclusive has another film here, Can a Song Save Your Life? which is also repped by Rena Ronson, Co-Head of the Independent Film Group of UTA. Directed by John Carney who came to the public’s attention with his micro-budgeted Once which plays on stage here in Toronto at the moment, in New York and elsewhere regularly. The Weinstein Company picked it up in Toronto, reportedly paying around a $7 million minimum guarantee for U.S. rights with a P&A commitment of at least $20 million.
UTA as an agency also packages both large (studio) and smaller indie films. Rena Ronson, the co-head of UTA Indie explained how her own indie roots -- first at indie distributor Fox-Lorber and continuing into international sales before becoming the “indie agent” at Wma, succeeding the “indie” founder, Bobbi Thompson, have taught her to speak the language of the international as well as the independent film business. She knows the major modes of operating as well as she knows the independent style of business. She further explained that the successes of the larger films permit the “smaller”, i.e., “indie” films to be made.
UTA repped films in Toronto are listed below. For a full report of rights sold, before, during and after Toronto, watch SydneysBuzz.com for the Fall 2013 Rights Roundup.
Can A Song Save Your Life?
Writer/Director: John Carney Starring: Mark Ruffalo, Keira Knightley, Hailee Steinfeld, Adam Levine, Catherine Keener, Mos Def, Cee-Lo Green Publicity: Falco / Shannon Treusch, Monica Delameter U.S. Producer Rep: UTA / CAA . Isa: Exclusive Media Group
U.S. rights were acquired at Tiff 13 by TWC for a record breaking $7 million.
Since first announcing it in Cannes 2012, Exclusive has made other deals as well for Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan (Tanweer), Germany (Studiocanal), Japan (Pony Canyon Inc), Philippines (Solar Entertainment), Russia (A Company), So. Korea ( Pancinema), Switzerland ( Ascot Elite Entertainment Group ), Taiwan ( Serenity Entertainment International ), Turkey (D Productions), the Middle East ( Front Row Filmed Entertainment).
Tiff Special Presentations:
Hateship, Loveship
Director: Liza Johnson Writer: Mark Poirier Writer (Novel): Alice Munro Starring: Kristen Wiig, Guy Pearce, Hailee Steinfeld, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Nick Nolte Publicity: Prodigy PR, Erik Bright
North American Sale: UTA / Cassian Elwes. Isa: The Weinstein Co. Sena has rights for Iceland.
The F Word
Director: Michael Dowse Writer: Elan Mastai Writers (Play): Michael Rinaldi & T.J. Dawe Starring: Daniel Radcliffe, Zoe Kazan, Rafe Spall, Adam Driver, Mackenzie Davis, Amanda Crew Publicity: Strategy PR / Cynthia Schwartz, Michael Kupferberg Us Sale: UTA / Lichter, Grossman, Nichols, Adler & Feldman. Isa: eOne
After UTA sold the The F Word to CBS Films for the U.S. for around $3 million in Toronto, Entertainment One Films International completed other international sales. Besides Canada and the U.K., eOne itself will release the film in Australia/New Zealand, Benelux and Spain feeding its own international distribution pipeline. Other sales include Germany to Senator Entertainment, Middle East to Front Row Entertainment, Nigeria toRed Mist, Russia to Carmen Film Group, Turkey to Mars Entertainment Group
Night Moves
Writer/Director: Kelly Reichart Writer: Jonathan Raymond Starring: Dakota Fanning, Jesse Eisenberg, Peter Sarsgaard, Alia Shawkat Publicity: Ginsberg/Libby, Chris Libby North American Sale: UTA Isa: The Match Factory
Tiff Vanguard
The Sacrament
Writer/Director: Ti West Starring: Joe Swanberg, Aj Bowen, Amy Seimetz, Kate Lyn Sheil, Gene Jones Publicity: Dda, Dana Archer, Alice Zhou North American Sale: UTA / CAA Isa: Im Global sold to Pegasus Motion Pictures Distribution Ltd . For China
As of this writing, rather 1 hour ago, Magnolia Pictures, which lost on an earlier bidding war here for Joe, is finalizing a deal for the picture reportedly for seven figures.
Coincidentallywith the beginning of the Toronto Film Festival, the front page of L.A. Times quoted Rena Ronson in an article called "Making history as cameras roll" (print edition) or "Wadjda' director makes her mark in Saudi cinema" (online edition) about Wadjda , (Isa: The Match Factory) last year’s Venice and Telluride film which Rena had spotted at the Abu Dhabi Film Festival, where it won a script award. It was written and directed by a woman which is notable in such a male-dominated part of the world. She met the writer-director, Haifaa Mansour, and that led to working with her for the next two years to finance the film. Its $2.5m budget was backed in part by the Rotana Group, the largest media company in the Middle East, owned primarily by Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal. The German production company Razor Film owned and operated by Gerhard Meixner and Roman Paul whose first coproduction in 2005, Paradise Now brought them into international prominence and who also picked up last year’s Tiff groundbreaking film from Afghanistan,The Patience Stone, and previously coproduced Waltz With Bashir, came on board and brought German broadcast deals and German film funds as well.
Doha and Film Financing
The fourth panelist was Paul Miller, Head of Film Financing, from the Doha Film Institute , Qatar's first international organization dedicated to film financing, production, education and two film festivals. Doha encourages submission for financing film financing opportunities from anywhere in the world. The Dfi Grants program supports first- and second-time filmmakers in producing and developing their own stories. There are two funding rounds per year. Applications are considered from three regions (basically divided into the Middle East, developing nations and the rest of the world – with some exceptions -- each with different eligibility criteria.
Consideration for funding is open to feature-length films in development, production and post-production, as well as short films in production and post-production. Since 2010, Dfi has provided funding to more than 138 filmmakers.
Beyond the regional grants program, Dfi also invests in a diverse slate of international productions to encourage greater collaboration, mentorship and co‑production opportunities between Gulf countries and the rest of the world. Co-financing applications apply to both Middle Eastern and international feature films, television and web series. Submissions are accepted on a rolling basis throughout the year.
Four films at Tiff that Doha has helped finance:
Mohammed Malas’s Ladder to Damacus, screening in Tiff’s Contemporary World Cinema section; Jasmila Žbanic’s For Those Who Can Tell No Tales in the Special Presentation section. Both films were co-financed by Dfi. Dfi grant recipients Néjib Belkadhi’s Bastardo and Mais Darwazah’s My Love Awaits Me by the Sea screening in the Contemporary World Cinema and Discovery sections, respectively.
The fifth panelist, Ted Hope, Director of the San Francisco Film Society, a non-profit training, festival, and funding operation is known to everyone from his history with Good Machine (which was acquired by Universal and renamed Focus Features), and from his blog Hope for Film/ Truly Free Film . In his always-inimitable fashion, Ted proposed a new sort of financing, called "staged financing", based on a progressive meeting of certain criterion from development through distribution. This way of financing is similar to the venture capital models of financing. His broad ideas on what has to change with the industry's funding and packaging methods brought the panelists and the audience to heel at attention. I reprint his blog after this because this idea goes against the current grain of financing an entire film which may or may not prove to be the final box office bingo winner it always purports to be when securing full financing.
The Sffs provided some funding to Thomas Oliver's 1982 which is in Tiff this year. Aside from winning Us in Progress’ $60,000 in post-production services at this year’s Champs Elysees Film Festival, 1982 also received Sffs’s $85,000 post production grant and participated in the Sffs’s A2E labs. The film is being represented by Kevin Iwashina’s Preferred Content.
The panel became very animated as Ted Hope and Rena Ronson faced off about whether a film is made for a broad audience or whether, if targeted correctly, it could actually make money with niche audiences. As always, the two of them, both equally astute, brought much to bear on both sides of the argument. And, I, as the panel’s moderator, hereby declare, They are both right.
The broader the audience the more potential for making money.
However, as Ted points out, with crowd sourcing, crowd funding and crowd theatrical exhibition, there are many other ways beyond ticket purchases that filmmakers can offer in order to make money with their targeted audience.
This, as well as the great contributions made by Doha’s Paul Miller and Revolution’s Andrew Eaton could have extended the panel into a full day. Paul Oliver of Cross Creek was the quietest, perhaps most reticent, of the speakers, but he amply demonstrated that he is one who puts his money where his mouth is. His acumen and taste make us all grateful for his existence as he is a pivotal point person in creating works of art that create substantial revenues for a sustainable art house film business.
The audience as well was most enthusiastic with their questions and post panel discussions with panelists who stayed to talk.
Articles Reprinted Here:
Truly Free Film
Staged Financing Must Become Film Biz’s Immediate Goal
Posted: 06 Sep 2013 05:15 Am Pdt
Each day I become more and more convinced that staged financing could be a cure to much of the Film Biz’s ills. Staged financing? What? Is the phrase not exactly center of your conversations right now? Why not?!! Whatsamattawidyou? Don’t you know a good solution when you see one?
Although it already exists in many fields, and even in a few small patches of our own yard, I recognize that a staged financing strategy is not yet the force behind Indieland’s own gardening. I am however growing convinced it could yield a far more fruitful harvest than our current methods. A staged-financing ecosystem can’t be built in a one-off manner though. Although it also does not need to the rule of the realm, it needs a permanent eco-system to support it.
Staged financing is part of a much bigger solution that we urgently need to bring to our industry: a sustainable investor class . We need smart money and need to stop seeking, encouraging, and propagating dumb money. Most film investors get out, win or lose, by their third film (I have been told this and don’t have the stats to back it up now, but if you do, please share — otherwise just trust that is what my experience has shown). The value of most independent money in the film biz is the money itself, and that is not good for anyone.
Staged financing is exactly what it says to be. I know in this world such literalness is a strange thing, but there is it. Staged financing is a funding process that is there for each distinct stage. In comparison, it is the opposite of up-front financing — the type that monopolizes the narrative feature world. I am proposing that we institutionalize the staged-financing process and make it easier to finance your film in drips and drabs. Why am I so bullish on what probably sounds like hell to many? Why do I think it will save indie film? Let’s count the ways.
Staged financing increases the predictability of success. Investors can base their continued commitment on a proof of prinicipal instead of just a pitch. The longer one waits the more they know — of course the longer one waits the lower the chance for their to be the opportunity for investment, so there. The more investors can project or even predict their success, the longer they will stay in the game, and the more that will gather to pay — i.e. more capital at play! Staged financing allows filmmakers and their supporters to pivot based on real world data. The old way had very little it could do when new information hit. Your film (and investment) could be rendered obsolete over night. But that does not have to be a done deal is this new world. This is just one of the many reasons for #1 above of course. Staged financing diversifies the creative class. Wouldn’t it be great if the film biz was actually a meritocracy? Well, if people had to make good movies to complete their financing, wouldn’t that be a bit closer to the case? Staged financing gives all people the opportunity to prove they have a good idea, whether that idea is completed or not. It is not about who you know, but about what you’ve done and can do. Documentary film — compared to the narrative world — already has a great deal of staged financing institutionalized — and benefits from gender proportional representation among directors. Need I say more?Staged financing allows ambitious artistic work to flourish. Instead of just having “commercial elements”, unique and inspiring work can be recognized for the potential it truly has. Instead of being rewarded for being able to earn trust or arrogantly claim to know what one is doing, staged financing allows good work to be rewarded for being good work. Currently, we mistake confidence for capability and those that boast to be able to predict what the end product will be (where there is no way that they will actually know what the 100+ decisions each day will yield), get to play — not the work that delivers something new and wonderful. Staged financing rewards quality over risk mitigation. Staged financing is actually a better form of risk mitigation than the present form that is only based on regurgitating what has already proven successful. When we limit risk by mimicking what has worked in the past, all we are doing is guessing and covering our ass — and this leads to a film culture of movie titles overrun with numerals. We live in an era of abundance, and as comforting as the familiar may be, we have more access to it than ever before. We rarely need the new version of it. We will however need truly original work more and more as time goes on as we will drowning in the repetitive. How will we prove what works? Staged financing, my friend, staged financing. Staged financing creates a better project as it incentivizes the creators every step of the way. Not that you truly need to incentivize those that are in the passion industries for the right reason, but it never hurts to weed out those that are in it for the wrong reason. When your financing is based on your work and not your connections or investors’ fears, you will do all you can to make each stage of financing shine, justify itself, and be truly competitive. Staged financing requires you to walk a series of steps, proving you have earned the right with every advance — and you better do your homework if you don’t want to get left behind. Staged financing requires you choose your initial partners wisely. It’s not just about the terms of the deal that should determine whom your investors are — but that is how we generally act nowadays. Everyone should instead seek value-add investors. You should get more than just money from your investors. You should benefit from their expertise. Filmmakers, agents, lawyers, and managers, often are willing to leap into bed with anyone who offers the most cash — there’s a name for that practice and it should not be film investment. Staged financing means the creators will have “skin in the game”. When it is an up-front finance model, the creators are not working for a payout in success but working just for the upfornt fees (or some semblance thereof); they may have “profit participation” but basically the only anticipated earnings are what is in the budget. It becomes increasingly difficult to motivate the creative team to be engaged in the needed work after the film premieres. Investors have long recognized that this is not the most beneficial arrangement, yet what can they do? The answer my friend, is… yup, you know the song I am singing: everyone loves that staged financing! Staged financing is a time-tested process that has already been adopted by many industries . Staged financing is the modus operandi of Silicon Valley and all the Vc firms. Other industries, from mining onwards, have seen real benefits from the process. Why do we limit our success and not apply proven models to our field? Could it be that somewhere someone is desperately clutching on to what ever paltry power they perceive themselves to possess? Hmmm… If they don’t offer the model you want at the store, build a new model — or maybe even a chain of stores. Staged financing gives producers of quality work more power. The main objection to staged financing is that it gives financiers more power. That is only true if you are making crap. Or mediocre work. If you are making something wonderfully astounding you will never struggle to progress to the next round — and in fact you will be able to improve your terms. And investors won’t complain either, because they now can have to know a good thing when they see one.
So if Staged Financing is this marvelous thing, why have our leaders not yet delivered it to you? Well, they don’t care about you; didn’t you know that?
And if Staged Financing could really save Indie Film, why has the community not constructed this marvelous ecosystem yet? Well, we’ve all been too busy chasing shiny objects and marveling at the reflections fed back of us.
But change is here. We have hope. We can build it better together. And I have already started. The San Francisco Film Society is committed to it. We have others who want to be part of. We are have spots for more to join in. And we are going to help a few select projects really rock this world.
Watch this space. Let’s do it together and truly astonish the world with your awe inspiring work. Just don’t be slack, okay?
Variety, August 21, 2013:
“Rush,” the high-octane car racing film about the public rivalry between legendary Formula One drivers Niki Lauda and James Hunt during the 1970s, has all the markings of tinseltown’s latest flashy biopic, withRon Howard at the wheel, Chris Hemsworth as its star, and Universal Pictures releasing the film Sept. 27. But that assumption couldn’t be further from the truth.
“It is going to be easy for people to think this is a Hollywood movie, and it just is not,” says the upcoming film’s British screenwriter, Peter Morgan, who penned “Frost/Nixon,” also directed by Howard. “It is a British independent film directed by a Hollywood director.” Get Weekly Online News and alerts free to your inbox
As the majors focus more on putting their money behind mega-budgeted projects with built-in brand awareness — sequels, reboots, films based on toys, videogames and comicbooks — filmmakers are finding Hollywood’s studio system rapidly shifting under their feet.
“Because studios are less interested in the midbudget area, there is a massive opportunity for independents to step into that (area) at the moment,” says “Rush” producer Andrew Eaton of London-based Revolution Films.
Indeed, it’s getting harder to set up a midbudget range original project at a studio, even for veteran filmmakers like Howard and his producing partner Brian Grazer, whose Imagine Entertainment has had an overall deal at Universal for 27 years (the longest standing deal U has had in its 100-year history with a production company). That’s forced directors to look elsewhere to tackle the kinds of films now considered too risky to make or the ones that won’t fill retail shelves with merchandise.
Another Hollywood vet, producer Marc Platt, who’s had a production deal at Universal since 1998 after stepping down as its production head, similarly had to find indie financing for his film “2 Guns” after Universal said it would not bankroll the picture but simply distribute it.
With “Rush,” Howard found himself in an entirely new role as the director of a $50 million film that was his first to be independently financed — through a series of bonds, contingencies and pre-sales. He also was a director for hire, replacing Paul Greengrass, who was originally set to bring the showy personalities of Hunt (Hemsworth), a British playboy; and the more serious Austrian champion Lauda (Daniel Bruhl) to the big screen.
“We must champion the fact that this is basically 80% a British film in terms of the people who worked on it, the way it was structured and the way we ran it,” says Eaton. The exec, who was behind such indie films as “24 Hour Party People” and the “Red Riding” series, is modest, and like most Brits politely shies away from the spotlight, tending not to grab credit even when its due.
But he believes “Rush” shows off Blighty’s mettle.
“These are the kinds of films we should be making in the U.K. because we can do it, and we can do it for better value of money,” he says.
Morgan began writing the story of Lauda, a friend of his wife’s, on spec some years ago, intrigued by the driver’s courageous comeback just 40 days after a devastating crash at the 1976 German Grand Prix that severely burned his face and saw him lapse into a coma, and how that might play against Hunt’s notorious womanizing and party lifestyle that gained him rock-star status.
Eager to work with Eaton again after Fernando Meirelles’ “360,” Morgan showed the producer the first draft of “Rush,” and Eaton was hooked.
“Andrew was always going to be a great fit for this project,” Morgan says. “If (the) responsibility was to make this at a price, Andrew could do this. He could make a $50 million film feel like a $150 million film.”
With Greengrass, another Brit, attached to direct, Morgan showed the script to close friend Eric Fellner at his Universal-owned British production outfit Working Title. Fellner, who had worked with him on “Frost/Nixon,” loved the new script and offered it to Universal for funding.
But the studio passed, considering it risky subject matter, given the biopic elements and low profile of F1 racing in the U.S. Universal also didn’t believe the film could be made for the right price. Still Fellner stayed onboard, and his contacts in the F1 arena proved invaluable. His relationships with Ferrari and McLaren thanks to his work on documentary “Senna” enabled “Rush” to enlist the brands in the pic without losing editorial control.
“Ron (Howard) jokes that my major contribution was engine noise,” Fellner says. “Maybe I can take credit for a bit of that.”
Soon after Universal passed, Cross Creek Pictures topper Brian Oliver reached out to Eaton to finance the project — so eager that he offered to put up $2 million before he even signed the deal so that Eaton could order replicas of the 1970s cars to be ready in time for the shoot. He also was instrumental in steering Hemsworth toward the project.
“Typically we don’t spend that kind of money without knowing the movie is going and the budget is done,” Oliver says. “But I was passionate about the script, and I really thought it was a film with a lot of heart, not just a race car movie.”
Cross Creek, also behind “The Ides of March” and “Black Swan,” has quickly become one of Hollywood’s biggest and more unusual financiers of risky films, with coin coming mostly from oil and real estate investments in Texas.
“He’s an unusual maverick in Hollywood because he really fought to get the budget to the highest level he could,” says Eaton of Oliver. “There’s no bullshit with him — he gets stuff done.” Adds Fellner: “Without Brian, the film wouldn’t have gotten off of the ground. He put his money where his mouth is.”
Shortly after funding started coming together, Greengrass dropped off the project due, ironically, to his issues with the budget. Within 24 hours, Morgan and Fellner enticed Howard to come onboard. The financing arrangement intrigued him, but what really attracted Howard was the ability to re-create the world of Formula One in the 1970s “when sex was safe and driving was dangerous,” as he has said in past interviews.
“Ron was incredibly gracious in trusting us to deliver,” Eaton says. “He was very smart about knowing we needed to make this film in a different way. He’d never made a film with a bond before, and never made a film with a contingency before, but he rolled up his sleeves and was ready to learn.” Some of that indie spirit has already rubbed off on Howard, who is now sticking with a mostly British crew on his next project, “In the Heart of the Sea,” including “Rush” cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle and costume designer Julian Day. “Heart” lenses in London.
Exclusive Media came in as the final partner on “Rush,” brought in by Oliver under his deal with Exclusive to jointly finance two projects per year.
Cross Creek split the cost of the pic with Exclusive, with the former putting its own cash in to the pic and the latter financing through a bank loan made against pre-sales generated in 2011 at the Afm, where Howard helped shop the project to buyers. The move proved a success, as Exclusive secured $33 million in foreign pre-sales.
Additionally, Oliver and Eaton structured the project as a U.K.-German co-production, enabling them to secure about $12 million in soft money.
As a result, U.K. rights ended up going to Studiocanal. Universal agreed to distribute “Rush” in the U.S. through its output deal with Cross Creek.
Eaton pressed to put all of the money raised on the screen. “Rush” became the highest-budget film he had ever worked with after 2000’s “The Claim,” which cost $18 million to produce.
“(‘Rush’) was financed in exactly the same way we finance every independent film, and we approached shooting in the same way as we do everything — you try to put as much money as you can onscreen,” Eaton says. “It’s about not wasting money on things you don’t need, like private jets and extravagances.”
Hollywood has tried to bring to life the world of Formula One before.
Sylvester Stallone directed “Driven,” which originally was set in the world of F1, before he changed course and based it on rival Cart racing, instead.
The reason? To gain access to F1, filmmakers must first get the greenlight from the often polarizing Bernie Ecclestone, the 82-year-old billionaire who holds a tight grip on the racing league that has long counted the elite as fans, including Carlos Slim, the world’s richest man, and celebs including Michael Fassbender, Patrick Dempsey, Gordon Ramsey, George Lucas, and Cirque de Soleil founder Guy Laliberte.
Although Stallone tried to gain Ecclestone’s approval, “I apologize to fans of Formula 1, but there is a certain individual there who runs the sport that has his own agenda,” Stallone said in 2000. “F1 is very formal, and it’s very hard to get to know people.”
David Cronenberg also planned to direct a tentpole around F1 for Paramount, in 1986, with the director scouting the project by attending Grand Prix races in Australia and Mexico. The film, “Red Cars,” would have revolved around American driver Phil Hill winning the world championship for Ferrari in 1961. Plans were shelved when Ecclestone decided not to support the project. Instead, Cronenberg published a limited edition art book based on the screenplay in 2005.
One of the few cinematic standouts so far is Asif Kapadia’s documentary “Senna,” about the charismatic Brazilian driver Ayrton Senna, killed in a race in 1994 that’s show in the docu. “Senna” went on to earn $8.2 million, and helped educate viewers of the sport by focusing not on the races but Senna’s iconic presence and his impact on pop culture.
“Rush” is looking to put a spotlight on the personalities behind the wheel and the often riveting rivalries between drivers — what many consider the real draw to the sport. Bruhl has compared them to “modern knights constantly facing death.”
As the film races toward its September release — it will be shown at the Toronto Film Festival out of competition — Howard has screened it for not only racing fans but Formula One, itself.
He recently showed the film to a group of F1 drivers (including Lauda, Lewis Hamilton, Nico Rosberg and Felipe Massa) at Germany’s Grand Prix, calling that audience the toughest test so far, and comparing the experience to screening “Apollo 13” to Nasa’s astronauts and mission controllers in 1995.
In his efforts to promote the film, Howard has called the Hunt-Lauda rivalry one of the greatest in all of sports. “Their story is so remarkable, you (could) only do it if it was true, because people wouldn’t quite believe it. They were willing to risk their lives to attain this elite status. They paid a price for it, but they defined themselves.”
Morgan also has been doing his part to reassure F1 fans that the film is authentic, stressing that it’s about the people in the cars, and not the sport itself.
Any way the wheel’s spun, it’s clear the film’s overall success will largely be driven by how it plays overseas. “Rush” will need to appeal to an international audience that’s more familiar with F1 — a sport second in popularity only to soccer — than to those in the U.S.
But Howard needs to hook moviegoers closer to home — making the American director’s job a much tougher sell.
It’s not really that surprising that there’s nothing all that American about “Rush.”
Formula One is still struggling to find an audience in the U.S. It’s looking to change that through a new $3 million broadcasting deal with NBC Sports that airs 13 races on the cable channel, two on CNBC, and four on NBC. The Monaco Grand Prix was the first of four F1 races to air live on NBC this year, with the final race taking place Nov. 24 from Brazil.
Ratings have averaged a 0.3 rating, although the Monaco race was watched by 1.5 million viewers, making it the most-watched Formula One race on U.S. television in six years, and up 40% over last year’s race when it aired on Speed TV, Nielsen said.
Promos have emphasized the speed of F1’s jetfighter cars, its international appeal and Olympics-like profiles of the drivers.
Formula One also is looking to rev up new fans in the U.S. through the opening of its first permanent track in Austin, Texas, last year, known as the Circuit of the Americas. Howard attended its first race, where Lauda also roamed the track’s garages.
What’s ironic is that Howard isn’t a very good driver. He proved that recently racing around the track of BBC’s hit show “Top Gear” to promote “Rush,” ending up in second to last place on the series’ celebrity leader board — behind Genesis’ Mike Rutherford.
Host Jeremy Clarkson was quick to mock him, saying “We finally found something you can’t do. Good at directing, brilliant in ‘Happy Days,’ a charming human being — but utterly crap at driving.”
Ron Howard's Risky Formula One Movie, 'Rush'
Can this Euro-centric car racing film play in the U.S.?
By Rachel Dodes Conn
Ron Howard's films, like "Apollo 13" and "Frost/Nixon," typically deal with issues very familiar to American audiences. His latest project, Mr. Howard's first independently financed film, is a bit of a departure: "Rush" chronicles the rivalry between Austrian Formula One racer Niki Lauda and his nemesis, the British driver James Hunt, over the course of the historic 1976 season. While competing in Nürburg, Germany during treacherous weather conditions, Mr. Lauda (Daniel Brühl, right) crashed his Ferrari and sustained severe burns to his face and lungs. Yet, fueled by a desire to beat Mr. Hunt (Chris Hemsworth, above), a playboy type whose wife (Olivia Wilde) ran off with Richard Burton, Mr. Lauda was back in his car just six weeks later—still wearing his bandages—to race against him in the Italian Grand Prix.
When Mr. Howard received the script on spec from screenwriter Peter Morgan ("Frost/Nixon," "The Last King of Scotland"), he wasn't a Formula One fan and didn't know who Messrs. Hunt and Lauda were. "I looked them up on Wikipedia," he admits. But as he read about the racers' personalities, he started to see broader themes that would appeal to U.S. moviegoers. "Maybe this is the American in me identifying this," he says, "but both these guys are utterly and entirely individuals—there was no Yoda telling them to seek their higher self."
For Mr. Howard, the process of researching "Rush" was surprisingly similar to learning about space travel for his "Apollo 13," because he found himself having to make arcane automotive engineering terms accessible to viewers. "It was really fun to understand a sport that combines cutting-edge technology with very dangerous competition," he says. "The visceral, cool and sexy element offered a kind of cinematic experience that nowadays exists only with sci-fi."
Formula One isn't nearly as popular in the U.S. as Nascar, and the subject matter is likelier to play well overseas, where the film's financing came from. It premiered Monday, in London, a few weeks before its U.S. opening. The filmmakers say it's more than just a sports picture, and they expect it to appeal to women as well as men.
Saudi Female Filmmaker Succeeds In Making A Movie About A Girl Who Wants A Bicycle
Los Angeles Times
By Rebecca Keegan
Sept. 6, 2013
In a country where women can't freely move around, Haifaa Mansour covertly films the story of a girl's quest for a bicycle.
The production lost two days to sandstorms. The crew faced a last-minute scramble when the nervous owner of a mall changed his mind about allowing filming there. Some days locals chased the cameras away; other days they brought platters of lamb and rice to the set, and asked to be extras.
Meanwhile, the director hid in a van, speaking to her cast via walkie-talkie. In Saudi Arabia, where driving a car is a subversive act for a woman, a 39-year-old mother of two has done something remarkable: written and directed what her distributor believes is the first feature film shot entirely in the ultraconservative kingdom.
Haifaa Mansour is the director of "Wadjda," a drama about a plucky 10-year-old girl who enrolls in a Koran recitation competition in order to win money for a bicycle she's forbidden by law to ride.
Like her young protagonist, Mansour's own story is one of feminine moxie.
In a sly protest of the country's ban on women behind the wheel, she drove herself to her wedding in a golf cart. Because women in Saudi Arabia can't mingle publicly with men outside their families, she shot her movie covertly on the streets of the capital, Riyadh. With movie theaters banned, she screened "Wadjda" in two foreign embassies and a cultural center.
Petite, self-assured, wearing white high-tops and blue nail polish, Mansour is modern in both her fashion and bearing. She speaks English quickly and colloquially, dropping frequent "you knows" into conversation. And she isn't afraid to counter misperceptions about her homeland, as when she gently corrected Bill Maher for calling Mecca the Saudi capital during a recent appearance on his HBO show.
Laced with empathy and humor, "Wadjda" is a quietly provocative portrait of a culture that straddles the centuries, where men wear the ancient white thobe but carry the latest iPads and women hold important jobs as doctors and news anchors but have yet to vote in an election.
"I didn't want to make a movie about women being raped or stoned," Mansour said in an interview in Beverly Hills in June. "For me it is the everyday life, how it's hard. For me, it was hard sometimes to go to work because I cannot find transportation. Things like that build up and break a woman."
The eighth of 12 children of a poet, Mansour grew up in a small town in a home that she describes as nurturing for a little girl.
"My family is very traditional, but my parents are very supportive, very kind," she said. "I never felt I can't do things because I'm a woman."
When Mansour was a teen, her mother removed the light veil she wore while picking her daughter up from school, a gesture that mortified the young woman at the time, but empowers her when she reflects on it now.
Though movie theaters have been shuttered in Saudi Arabia for decades for religious reasons, Mansour said her father, like others, often rented VHS tapes at Blockbuster for the family to watch -- she grew up on Jackie Chan movies, Bollywood productions, Egyptian cinema and Disney animated films. "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" was a particular favorite.
"In small-town Saudi, there is nothing to do. You don't get to exercise your emotions because nothing much is happening, you know?" she said. "So to see people falling in love and fighting, it's so powerful, you see beyond your small town."
After earning her bachelor's degree in comparative literature at the American University in Cairo, she returned to Saudi Arabia but quickly felt stymied.
"Going back to Saudi as a young woman, trying to assert yourself in the workplace, you have all those ideas … and all of a sudden you realize because you are a woman you are not heard," she said. "It was such a frustrating moment in my life. It was as if you are screaming in a vacuum."
The idea of women holding jobs still unnerves some Saudi men -- writer Abdullah Mohammed Daoud recently encouraged his more than 97,000 Twitter followers to sexually harass female grocery store clerks to intimidate women from working.
Recalling the freedom she found in movies, Mansour decided to make a short film with her siblings serving as cast and crew, a thriller about a male serial killer who hides under the black abaya worn by Muslim women. Her work -- two more shorts, a documentary and a stint hosting a talk show for a Lebanese network -- focused largely on the untold stories of Saudi women.
In 2005, at a U.S. embassy screening of her documentary, "Women Without Shadows," Mansour met her future husband, American diplomat Bradley Neimann. They now have two children, 2 and 5, and live in Bahrain, where Neimann works for the State Department.
When her husband was posted in Australia, Mansour pursued a master's in film studies at the University of Sydney, and wrote the script that became "Wadjda."
The story was inspired by her now teenage niece, who has tamped down her rambunctious personality to fit into Saudi norms.
"I thought, 'Wow, a woman writer from Saudi Arabia won?'" Rena Ronson said. "I had to meet her. She was so open and tenacious and smart."When Mansour's script for "Wadjda" won an award at the Abu Dhabi Film Festival, it caught the eye of the co-head of the independent film group at United Talent Agency.
Over the next two years Ronson helped Mansour secure financing for her film, which cost a little less than $2.5 million. The primary obstacle, as far as many potential Middle Eastern producers were concerned, was Mansour's desire to shoot in Saudi Arabia, which she felt lent her story authenticity.
The production finally won the tacit approval of the Saudi government -- one of its backers is Rotana Group, an entertainment company primarily owned by Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal. Another major financier is the German company Razor Film.
Finding actors was another hurdle. Mansour and her producers recruited child performers through small companies that hire folkloric dancers for the Eid holidays. Many of their parents were uncomfortable with a movie about empowering women.
A week before she was scheduled to start shooting, Mansour still hadn't cast her title character when 12-year-old Waad Mohammed entered the room in blue jeans, with headphones clapped over her ears. Singing along to Justin Bieber, she won over Mansour with her sweet singing voice and tomboyish style.
The movie's half-German, half-Saudi crew worked around the rhythms of Saudi life, using cellphone apps that alerted them of the five daily prayer calls. The Germans carried notebooks; the Saudis relied on oral planning.
On the first day of shooting, a start time of 7:20 a.m. came and went. "I don't know what we were thinking," said German producer Roman Paul. "I don't think 7:20 exists in Saudi time. We Germans learned to relax, and the Saudis learned that there is a benefit to doing things at a certain time."
Despite tension on the set -- both from disapproving observers and from the German and Saudi crews learning to work together -- Mansour was buoyant, Paul said.
"She's very fast in overcoming new difficulties, and in an upbeat spirit," Paul said.
Last summer "Wadjda" premiered at the Venice and Telluride film festivals, earning praise for Mansour's subtle direction and a U.S. release from Sony Pictures Classics, which handled the Oscar-winning 2011 Iranian drama "A Separation," about the dissolution of a marriage.
"'A Separation' was such an eye-opener to me in the sense that there were people questioning whether the film went too specific into the Iranian culture," said Michael Barker, co-president and co-founder of the Sony unit. "But if the overall story has a universal appeal, in 'Wadjda' it's about parents and kids and restrictions and freedom, that's something we can all relate to."
Sony Classics has been showing the film to noted feminists -- Gloria Steinem and Queen Noor of Jordan both attended screenings -- and will release it in the U.S. slowly over the fall, starting Sept. 13. (The movie premiered in multiple European countries this summer.)
Mansour said she plans to work in Saudi Arabia again. For her, screening her movie in the kingdom was a high.
"Film is about uplifting, embracing the love of life, it's about moving ahead, it's about victory," she said. "It's not about defeat."
One victory has already been won. This spring, a new law went into effect: With some restrictions, Saudi women are now allowed to ride bicycles.
- 9/15/2013
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
The dog days of August are almost over, which means blockbusters are taking a backseat to all those lovely prestige pictures the studios trot out when the leaves change and Meryl Streep gets her thirst for gold like the Oscar vampire she is.
Heavy hitters like Brad Pitt, Jennifer Lawrence, George Clooney, Josh Brolin, Michael Fassbender, Tom Hanks, Kristen Wiig, Chris Hemsworth and the ubiquitous Benedict Cumberbatch all pop up in multiple movies on our annual list of the Fall's best and brightest. Fan favs like Thor (as in "The Mighty"), Ron Burgundy, Katniss Everdeen, Jack Ryan and Machete chop their way back to the big screen with much fanfare, but this time of year is all about the Oscar bait — a Golden Globe simply won't do.
Prepare accordingly for the season below. (And also check out Film.com's Ultimate Fall Movie Preview, plus all kinds of good stuff on MTV's Fall Preview hub.
Heavy hitters like Brad Pitt, Jennifer Lawrence, George Clooney, Josh Brolin, Michael Fassbender, Tom Hanks, Kristen Wiig, Chris Hemsworth and the ubiquitous Benedict Cumberbatch all pop up in multiple movies on our annual list of the Fall's best and brightest. Fan favs like Thor (as in "The Mighty"), Ron Burgundy, Katniss Everdeen, Jack Ryan and Machete chop their way back to the big screen with much fanfare, but this time of year is all about the Oscar bait — a Golden Globe simply won't do.
Prepare accordingly for the season below. (And also check out Film.com's Ultimate Fall Movie Preview, plus all kinds of good stuff on MTV's Fall Preview hub.
- 8/26/2013
- by Max Evry
- NextMovie
The Toronto film festival unveiled its glittering programme this week with an impressive array of titles to charm canuck located cinefans when the 38th edition of the event commences on the 5th September 2013. Running for ten days the world’s largest movie festival in terms of volume of screenings boasts a global prestige and attracts talent from around the world, as one of the only major festivals which is open to the public the chances of rubbing shoulders with the superstars of California and Cannes ensure that tickets are swiftly snapped up for the huge variety of films and debates which arrange across the full gamut of the celluloid spectrum.
Now traditionally seen as strong candidate for highlighting potential future Oscar bait the directorial heavyweights of Europe and North America are out in force, with new films from Alfonso Cuarón, Xavier Dolan, Atom Egoyan, Steve McQueen, Kelly Reichardt, Jason Reitman,...
Now traditionally seen as strong candidate for highlighting potential future Oscar bait the directorial heavyweights of Europe and North America are out in force, with new films from Alfonso Cuarón, Xavier Dolan, Atom Egoyan, Steve McQueen, Kelly Reichardt, Jason Reitman,...
- 7/25/2013
- by John
- SoundOnSight
Review James Hunt 11 Mar 2013 - 10:15
It's the first SimCity game in a decade, but how does it compare to its predecessors? James finds out...
Call it SimCity 5, call it SimCity 2013, call it anything you like. It's the original city simulation game, and it's back for its first major instalment in ten years. But what's it actually like?
It's impossible to talk about SimCity right now without addressing the elephant in the room. "Nelly," I say, "how do you feel about the fact that inadequate server support has left thousands of paying customers unable to properly access SimCity for days following the launch?"
Unfortunately, I don't speak elephant, but it's clear from all the stamping and trumpeting that no one, person or pachyderm, considers this an acceptable situation. And while EA has been sufficiently humble regarding their failures, they've only addressed the botched implementation of the mandatory online component – the...
It's the first SimCity game in a decade, but how does it compare to its predecessors? James finds out...
Call it SimCity 5, call it SimCity 2013, call it anything you like. It's the original city simulation game, and it's back for its first major instalment in ten years. But what's it actually like?
It's impossible to talk about SimCity right now without addressing the elephant in the room. "Nelly," I say, "how do you feel about the fact that inadequate server support has left thousands of paying customers unable to properly access SimCity for days following the launch?"
Unfortunately, I don't speak elephant, but it's clear from all the stamping and trumpeting that no one, person or pachyderm, considers this an acceptable situation. And while EA has been sufficiently humble regarding their failures, they've only addressed the botched implementation of the mandatory online component – the...
- 3/11/2013
- by ryanlambie
- Den of Geek
Earlier today, at BAFTA headquarters, the shortlist of the five actors up for the 2012 Orange BAFTA Rising Star Award were announced, including Adam Deacon, Chris Hemsworth, Felicity Jones, Tom Hiddleston, Jennifer Lawrence, Chris O’Dowd, Jessica Chastain and Eddie Redmayne. And the final five, who are now subject to a public vote, are: Adam Deacon, Chris Hemsworth, Chris O’Dowd, Eddie Redmayne and Tom Hiddleston.
You can now vote for your favourite here and the winner will be announced at the Orange British Academy Film Awards on Sunday 13th February 2012. The press release in full:
Nominees Are Unveiled For The Orange Wednesdays Rising Star Award In 2012
The Orange Wednesdays Rising Star Award is the only award at the Orange British Academy Film Awards to be voted for by the British public Orange Wednesdays customers have selected the shortlist of five from a long list of eight determined by the award...
You can now vote for your favourite here and the winner will be announced at the Orange British Academy Film Awards on Sunday 13th February 2012. The press release in full:
Nominees Are Unveiled For The Orange Wednesdays Rising Star Award In 2012
The Orange Wednesdays Rising Star Award is the only award at the Orange British Academy Film Awards to be voted for by the British public Orange Wednesdays customers have selected the shortlist of five from a long list of eight determined by the award...
- 1/11/2012
- by Phil
- Nerdly
This morning, BAFTA HQ was the place to be as the final five were announced for the 2012 Orange BAFTA Rising Star Award. A panel of 13 people including Simon Pegg, Sienna Miller and Harry Potter Director David Yates scoured the globe for those rising stars and came up with list of 8 including Adam Deacon, Chris Hemsworth, Felicity Jones, Tom Hiddleston, Jennifer Lawrence, Chris O’Dowd, Jessica Chastain and Eddie Redmayne. It was your turn to whittle that list down even further and below are you final 5. The next job you have is to get that list down to the main winner and you can do that by voting here.
The final five are:
Adam Deacon, Chris Hemsworth, Chris O’Dowd, Eddie Redmayne and Tom Hiddleston!
Let us know what you think of that list in the comments section below. Strikes me that no women made the final five and I’m...
The final five are:
Adam Deacon, Chris Hemsworth, Chris O’Dowd, Eddie Redmayne and Tom Hiddleston!
Let us know what you think of that list in the comments section below. Strikes me that no women made the final five and I’m...
- 1/11/2012
- by David Sztypuljak
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
It may be a fickle goal – corrupting, even – but there’s no question that for the vast majority of actors the top of the Hollywood tree is the place to be.
And so, as we roll into 2012, and a fresh calendar of veritable quality mixed liberally with garbage and chewing gum for the eyes, we’ll see new gems unearthed, giants fall and movie stars made. Using the power of prediction, and Wall Street style logical growth trajectory, here are six actors likely to be Kings and Queens of Cinema by this time next year. Watch this space.
6. Chris Hemsworth
Harshly described by some as Sam Worthington Mk. II, Aussie heartthrob Hemsworth has already cemented himself firmly in Hollywood minds as the dynamic new wave superhero Thor, having worked his way from soap operas to supporting roles in the likes of Star Trek and A Perfect Getaway, all the way...
And so, as we roll into 2012, and a fresh calendar of veritable quality mixed liberally with garbage and chewing gum for the eyes, we’ll see new gems unearthed, giants fall and movie stars made. Using the power of prediction, and Wall Street style logical growth trajectory, here are six actors likely to be Kings and Queens of Cinema by this time next year. Watch this space.
6. Chris Hemsworth
Harshly described by some as Sam Worthington Mk. II, Aussie heartthrob Hemsworth has already cemented himself firmly in Hollywood minds as the dynamic new wave superhero Thor, having worked his way from soap operas to supporting roles in the likes of Star Trek and A Perfect Getaway, all the way...
- 1/9/2012
- by Scott Patterson
- SoundOnSight
Plans to use a disused airfield in Hampshire for director Ron Howard's new film have been opposed by a public body charged with protecting the environment. Natural England has objected to plans to turn part of Blackbushe Airfield near Yateley into a set for Rush. It is concerned the project could harm local heaths, but production company Rush Films claims filming in the area would create work for local businesses and employ around 100 local people as extras. Rush, which stars Olivia Wilde and is rumoured to feature Russell Crowe, centres on the rivalry between 1970s racers Niki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl) and James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth). A spokesman for Natural England told the BBC the location is near a legally protected Site of Special Scientific Interest (Sssi) and Special Protection Area (Spa). "One (more)...
- 1/7/2012
- by By Colin Daniels
- Digital Spy
Brian Oliver, President of Cross Creek Pictures, Simon Oakes, Vice-Chairman of Exclusive Media Group and President & CEO of Hammer Films and Guy East and Nigel Sinclair, Co-Chairmen of Exclusive Media Group (.Exclusive.) announced today that Hammer has acquired the rights to the novel .Boneshaker. by Cherie Priest for adaptation to the big screen. Project will be co-produced by Hammer and Cross Creek Pictures and co-financed by Exclusive and Cross Creek Pictures.
John Hilary Shepherd, a 2010 WGA Award nominee for his work on the first season of the Showtime series, .Nurse Jackie,. is writing the screenplay. Tobin Armbrust, Head of Production is overseeing the project.s development for Hammer Films.
An example of .steampunk. science-fiction, which incorporates futuristic innovations into a Victorian setting, Priest.s novel is set in an alternate version of 1880s Seattle, where the city has been walled in and a toxic gas has turned many of its remaining residents into .Rotters,...
John Hilary Shepherd, a 2010 WGA Award nominee for his work on the first season of the Showtime series, .Nurse Jackie,. is writing the screenplay. Tobin Armbrust, Head of Production is overseeing the project.s development for Hammer Films.
An example of .steampunk. science-fiction, which incorporates futuristic innovations into a Victorian setting, Priest.s novel is set in an alternate version of 1880s Seattle, where the city has been walled in and a toxic gas has turned many of its remaining residents into .Rotters,...
- 11/30/2011
- by Michelle McCue
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
The latest R-Patz fantasy epic racked up the fifth-biggest opener in Hollywood history, pushing franchise sales past $2bn
They're baa-ack. Bella, Edward and Jacob crushed the North American opposition as The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 took an estimated $139.5m in its opening weekend. This is the fifth-biggest opening weekend in Hollywood history, ranking one place behind New Moon's $142.8m. The $144m international weekend launch puts worldwide ticket sales over the first five days at $283.5m and pushes the Twilight franchise past $2bn in worldwide ticket sales. Part 2 comes out in late 2012 and I'd say there's a strong chance the series will cross $3bn.
Twilight continues to be a great endorsement of the independent sector. Commercial screenplays (regardless what one might think of the story or genre) backed by smart producers and sales agents with links to capital can draw top-notch talent, but the projects must be commercially sound...
They're baa-ack. Bella, Edward and Jacob crushed the North American opposition as The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 took an estimated $139.5m in its opening weekend. This is the fifth-biggest opening weekend in Hollywood history, ranking one place behind New Moon's $142.8m. The $144m international weekend launch puts worldwide ticket sales over the first five days at $283.5m and pushes the Twilight franchise past $2bn in worldwide ticket sales. Part 2 comes out in late 2012 and I'd say there's a strong chance the series will cross $3bn.
Twilight continues to be a great endorsement of the independent sector. Commercial screenplays (regardless what one might think of the story or genre) backed by smart producers and sales agents with links to capital can draw top-notch talent, but the projects must be commercially sound...
- 11/21/2011
- by Jeremy Kay
- The Guardian - Film News
Had everything gone Ron Howard's way, he would already be directing a movie adaptation of The Dark Tower, based on the novel series by Stephen King. Production was set to start in September, but Universal balked at the budget and ultimately pulled the plug on the project, which was planned as a trilogy of movies with TV series airing in between.
Recently, HBO agreed to air the TV portion of the ambitious adaptation, but a new studio has yet to agree to take on the movie trilogy. In the meantime, Howard has decide to bring his Academy Award–winning directorial skills to a different project, the Formula One racing biopic Rush, written by Howard's Frost/Nixon screenwriter Peter Morgan. Rush focuses on the complicated friendship between Formula One rivals James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Niki Lauda (Inglourious Basterds's Daniel Bruhl). A huge sport internationally, Howard told THR why American audiences will enjoy Rush.
Recently, HBO agreed to air the TV portion of the ambitious adaptation, but a new studio has yet to agree to take on the movie trilogy. In the meantime, Howard has decide to bring his Academy Award–winning directorial skills to a different project, the Formula One racing biopic Rush, written by Howard's Frost/Nixon screenwriter Peter Morgan. Rush focuses on the complicated friendship between Formula One rivals James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Niki Lauda (Inglourious Basterds's Daniel Bruhl). A huge sport internationally, Howard told THR why American audiences will enjoy Rush.
- 11/3/2011
- by Ryan Gowland
- Reelzchannel.com
Ron Howard is going to make people ''fall in love'' with Formula 1 racing with his new movie 'Rush'. The director has made a film about the worldwide racing tournament which centres on the rivalry between Austrian driver Niki Lauda - played by Daniel Bruhl - and British racer James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) in the 1970s, and believes the story is so explosive it will appeal to everyone. He told Collider: ''I love stories that centre on fascinating characters, and here you have psychologically complex, rare human beings, and they are also young and cool - and it's...
- 11/3/2011
- Virgin Media - Movies
Mark Romanek’s name suddenly seems to be in the frame for every blockbuster upcoming. In the past, he dropped out of shooting The Wolfman for Universal and was apparently in contention to make The Wolverine. But recently, Disney was considering him to shoot their Cinderella update, and now he’s the frontrunner to direct Dan Brown book-based thriller The Lost Symbol.According to Deadline, Sony is having serious talks with Romanek about handling the third outing for professor Robert Langdon (Tom Hanks), the inquisitive academic seen in The Da Vinci Code and Angels & Demons.While Ron Howard has directed the last two films, he’s decided to stick to producing this one alongside Brian Grazer (he’s also busy on other projects, including James Hunt drama Rush).The script, by Brown himself and Steven Knight, sees Langdon delving into the deep, dark, dangerous secrets of the Freemasons in Washington DC.
- 10/20/2011
- EmpireOnline
Sky Arts has unveiled details of its new celebrity interview series Living The Life. The ten-part series will consist of conversations between two famous faces, instead of being led by an interviewer. Among the celebrities taking part are Stephen Fry, Joanna Lumley, Caitlin Moran and Brigitte Nielsen. Sky Arts' channel director James Hunt said: "This series is a true who's who of the great and the good in their respective fields. "This style of interview is unusual and revealing, largely because each contributor is set at ease by a sense of shared experience, which makes for a very illuminating and unguarded discussion. It's a fascinating series, and we're delighted to have it on Sky Arts." Fry will converse with Bill Wyman, while Lumley will spend her hour with Melvyn Bragg. Moran (more)...
- 10/11/2011
- by By Catriona Wightman
- Digital Spy
It put up a brave fight during its opening weekend, but is DreamWorks' film about robot boxing punching above its weight?
DreamWorks needed a hit after Cowboys & Aliens and Fright Night stumbled in the summer, and it didn't necessarily get it over the weekend despite the No 1 launch of Real Steel. The $27.3m estimate was good enough to rule but this was another frail weekend and considering how much the movie must have cost (Hugh Jackman and all those robots don't come cheap), nobody at DreamWorks will breathe easily until we see how the movie fares in the coming weeks.
According to Deadline Hollywood, Real Steel needs to make at least $125m in North America "to keep Reliance's funding on track". This refers to the Indian corporate giant that stumped up half the capital to finance the reconstituted DreamWorks a couple of years ago. As Deadline and other outlets have recently reported,...
DreamWorks needed a hit after Cowboys & Aliens and Fright Night stumbled in the summer, and it didn't necessarily get it over the weekend despite the No 1 launch of Real Steel. The $27.3m estimate was good enough to rule but this was another frail weekend and considering how much the movie must have cost (Hugh Jackman and all those robots don't come cheap), nobody at DreamWorks will breathe easily until we see how the movie fares in the coming weeks.
According to Deadline Hollywood, Real Steel needs to make at least $125m in North America "to keep Reliance's funding on track". This refers to the Indian corporate giant that stumped up half the capital to finance the reconstituted DreamWorks a couple of years ago. As Deadline and other outlets have recently reported,...
- 10/10/2011
- by Jeremy Kay
- The Guardian - Film News
When you have two-time Academy Award-winning director Ron Howard (A Beautiful Mind) behind the camera, and twice-nominated writer Peter Morgan (Frost/Nixon) penning the script, you know that the project they’re working on together, Rush, is going to be brilliant.
The film will follow the real-life rivalry that existed between F1 drivers James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Niki Lauda (Daniel Brühl) in the 1970s.
News came back in August that Alexandra Maria Lara (Control) had taken the role of the female lead, presumably playing the love interest of Lauda. Word now comes via Deadline that Olivia Wilde (Tron: Legacy) will be taking the other female lead, playing the role of supermodel Suzy Miller.
“Miller fell in love with and married Hunt, a handsome, womanizing driver, but the most interesting part of their relationship is how Miller soon fell in love with Hunt’s actor pal, Richard Burton. Hunt and...
The film will follow the real-life rivalry that existed between F1 drivers James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Niki Lauda (Daniel Brühl) in the 1970s.
News came back in August that Alexandra Maria Lara (Control) had taken the role of the female lead, presumably playing the love interest of Lauda. Word now comes via Deadline that Olivia Wilde (Tron: Legacy) will be taking the other female lead, playing the role of supermodel Suzy Miller.
“Miller fell in love with and married Hunt, a handsome, womanizing driver, but the most interesting part of their relationship is how Miller soon fell in love with Hunt’s actor pal, Richard Burton. Hunt and...
- 10/8/2011
- by Kenji Lloyd
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
[1] Olivia Wilde has landed the coveted role of '70s supermodel Suzy Miller in Rush, Ron Howard's Peter Morgan-scripted drama about the real-life rivalry between British Formula One driver James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Austrian racer Niki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl). Miller married the womanizing Hunt, but then fell in love with Hunt's friend Richard Burton. Burton agreed to pay the $1 million divorce settlement that Hunt owned Miller, and then married Miller. Howard is reportedly eyeing Russell Crowe to play the supporting role of Burton, but it doesn't sound like negotiations are too far along at this time. Rush began preliminary shooting last month [2], but real principal photography is starting soon. [Deadline [3]] After the jump, Billy Crudup gets to show off his comedic chops while Helen Hunt, Maggie Grace, and Aaron Paul get to fight breast cancer. Billy Crudup tends to be more of a dramatic actor, but we could...
- 10/5/2011
- by Angie Han
- Slash Film
Ron Howard’s next movie, Rush, just keeps looking more promising with every new nugget of news. The film, which is about the rivalry between formula one drivers Niki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl) and James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth), is set in the 70s and Howard has already been to the famous Nurburgring circuit in Germany to film some racing footage with replica 70s formula one cars, even though it’s not released until 2013. Deadline are now reporting that Olivia Wilde has won the role of Suzy Miller, a supermodel who was married to Hunt, and presumably will play a considerably large part in the movie. Even more so when you see that she left Hunt for one Richard Burton, at the time one of the biggest stars in the world. Seeing as the film is primarily about Lauda and Hunt, I doubt the Burton aspect will be that big, but still...
- 10/5/2011
- by noreply@blogger.com (Leon)
- www.themoviebit.com
Ron Howard is a hot commodity in Hollywood right now after his ambitious approach to both the "Arrested Development" film and television series and the failed "The Dark Tower" adaptation. His next movie is the Formula One racing drama "Rush," and it just landed its latest high caliber talent.
Deadline is reporting that Olivia Wilde is the latest actress to join Howard's newest film. She'll play 1970s supermodel Suzy Miller, who ends up falling in love with and marrying main character James Hunt. "Thor" star Chris Hemsworth plays Hunt, and Deadline has learned that Howard hopes to recruit Russell Crowe to the film as well.
Check out the rest of today's casting news after the jump!
More Actors Join Schwarzenegger's "The Last Stand"
The stars of "The Last Stand" keep on rolling in. The latest to join the project are Rodrigo Santoro and Jaimie Alexander. Santoro will play a party-loving officer under Schwarzenegger's command,...
Deadline is reporting that Olivia Wilde is the latest actress to join Howard's newest film. She'll play 1970s supermodel Suzy Miller, who ends up falling in love with and marrying main character James Hunt. "Thor" star Chris Hemsworth plays Hunt, and Deadline has learned that Howard hopes to recruit Russell Crowe to the film as well.
Check out the rest of today's casting news after the jump!
More Actors Join Schwarzenegger's "The Last Stand"
The stars of "The Last Stand" keep on rolling in. The latest to join the project are Rodrigo Santoro and Jaimie Alexander. Santoro will play a party-loving officer under Schwarzenegger's command,...
- 10/5/2011
- by Terri Schwartz
- MTV Movies Blog
Olivia Wilde has signed up for the lead female role in Ron Howard's upcoming Formula One film Rush. The House and Change-Up star will play supermodel Suzy Miller in the movie about the rivalry between 1970s racers Niki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl) and James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth), Deadline reports. Miller was married to Hunt in 1974 but decided to file for divorce after she became romantically involved with Elizabeth Taylor's ex-husband Richard Burton. Hunt called on Burton to give him $$1 million (£647,398) in a divorce (more)...
- 10/5/2011
- by By Zakia Uddin
- Digital Spy
The First images of Russell Crowe in costume as Superman's biological father Jor-El have appeared online.
Crowe plays the Kryptonian scientist in Zack Snyder's Man of Steel and can be seen, in a number of Daily Mail images, wearing a costume with its own version of the S symbol and red cape.
Jor-El's wife Lara Lor-Van is now being portrayed by Ayelet Zurer after Julia Ormond left the production. Henry Cavill stars as the hero in the new movie, due out in June 2013.
It's also emerged that Crowe may play the late actor Richard Burton in Formula One racing drama Rush.
The film centres on the 70s rivalry between Austrian driver Niki Lauda - to be portrayed by Daniel Bruhl - and British driver James Hunt, played by Thor star Chris Hemsworth.
Olivia Wilde (Tron: Legacy, Cowboys & Aliens) has been cast as supermodel Suzy Miller, who marries Hunt and...
Crowe plays the Kryptonian scientist in Zack Snyder's Man of Steel and can be seen, in a number of Daily Mail images, wearing a costume with its own version of the S symbol and red cape.
Jor-El's wife Lara Lor-Van is now being portrayed by Ayelet Zurer after Julia Ormond left the production. Henry Cavill stars as the hero in the new movie, due out in June 2013.
It's also emerged that Crowe may play the late actor Richard Burton in Formula One racing drama Rush.
The film centres on the 70s rivalry between Austrian driver Niki Lauda - to be portrayed by Daniel Bruhl - and British driver James Hunt, played by Thor star Chris Hemsworth.
Olivia Wilde (Tron: Legacy, Cowboys & Aliens) has been cast as supermodel Suzy Miller, who marries Hunt and...
- 10/5/2011
- by David Bentley
- The Geek Files
Deadline has reported actress Olivia Wilde has been signed on to play supermodel Suzy Miller in the racing drama “Rush.” The film is about the Formula One race rivalry between British driver James Hunt and Austrian champion Niki Lauda in the 1970s. Miller is a supermodel who married Hunt, but eventually fell in love with his actor friend Richard Burton. Burton and Miller were married after a highly publicized divorce settlement at the time. Deadline also reported actor Russell Crowe may be recruited to play the small cameo as Richard Burton in the film. “Rush” will be directed by Ron Howard (“A Beautiful Mind,” “Cinderella Man”). It stars Chris Hemsworth (“Thor,” “The Avengers”) as James Hunt and Daniel Bruhl (“Inglourious Basterds,” “Goodbye Lenin!”) as Niki Lauda. The production will begin later this year in Europe.Source: Deadline...
- 10/5/2011
- LRMonline.com
Olivia Wilde’s name appears in connection with just about every female role going these days as she makes all the wish lists (except for maybe Mrs Thatcher – we’re pretty sure Streep had that one locked down) and is considered for most movies. Now it appears she’s bagged yet another role, winning the chance to play supermodel Suzy Miller in Ron Howard’s Formula One drama Rush.The film focuses on the intense sporting rivalry between champion racers James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Nikki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl). Such was their need for speed and competition that Lauda even left hospital early after a near fatal crash just so he could race against the Brit.But Hunt’s life was also complicated off the track, with the beautiful Miller falling for him and despite Hunt’s legendarily womanizing ways, they tied the knot in 1974. Yet it was Miller, not Hunt,...
- 10/5/2011
- EmpireOnline
It’s not a feature film about Ayrton Senna, but it will do. Ron Howard has been slowly putting the pieces of his true-life Formula 1 film Rush together, with scarce word about casting beyond the principal roles of Niki Lauda and James Hunt, but with the film recently starting production, that’s changing quickly. Olivia Wilde is reportedly joining the film, and she may not be alone, as Howard is apparently hoping to add Russell Crowe in a somewhat amusing and pretty spot-on role. Wilde’s role is a plum one – she’ll play 1970s supermodel Suzy Miller, who Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) married in 1974. Though the two were in love, Hunt was a bit of a womanizer (okay, fine, he reportedly slept with thirty-three British Airways flight attendants during a two-week period alone). Needless to say, Hunt and Miller’s marriage was short-lived, and not just because of Hunt’s catting around, but...
- 10/4/2011
- by Kate Erbland
- FilmSchoolRejects.com
Olivia Wilde Joins Rush With Russell Crowe In Talks
Tweet Deadline is reporting that Olivia Wilde will be joining Ron Howard‘s Rush. The story follows the friendship between Formula 1 drivers Niki Lauda and James Hunt and the rivalry that grew between the two. The film will star Inglourious Basterds star Daniel Brühl as Lauda, James Hunt will be played by Thor star Chris Hemsworth and Alexandra Maria [...]
Thanks for reading We Got This Covered...
Tweet Deadline is reporting that Olivia Wilde will be joining Ron Howard‘s Rush. The story follows the friendship between Formula 1 drivers Niki Lauda and James Hunt and the rivalry that grew between the two. The film will star Inglourious Basterds star Daniel Brühl as Lauda, James Hunt will be played by Thor star Chris Hemsworth and Alexandra Maria [...]
Thanks for reading We Got This Covered...
- 10/4/2011
- by Blake Dew
- We Got This Covered
While she may be down in the dumps today, Olivia Wilde is not letting love get her down.
According to Deadline, the "Cowboys and Aliens" actress will be playing the coveted role of 1970s supermodel Suzy Miller in "Rush."
From Ron Howard, the drama chronicles the feud between Formula One drivers Niki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl) and James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth)
The backstory's interesting, too; Wilde's character, Miller, fell in love with and married Hunt. But soon after, she fell in love with his friend, Richard Burton. Eventually, Burton and Miller married, only after he paid the $1 million divorce settlement.
The word is Russell Crowe is slotted to play the role of Burton in the film.
For more, click over to Deadline.
According to Deadline, the "Cowboys and Aliens" actress will be playing the coveted role of 1970s supermodel Suzy Miller in "Rush."
From Ron Howard, the drama chronicles the feud between Formula One drivers Niki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl) and James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth)
The backstory's interesting, too; Wilde's character, Miller, fell in love with and married Hunt. But soon after, she fell in love with his friend, Richard Burton. Eventually, Burton and Miller married, only after he paid the $1 million divorce settlement.
The word is Russell Crowe is slotted to play the role of Burton in the film.
For more, click over to Deadline.
- 10/4/2011
- by Jessie Heyman
- Huffington Post
Olivia Wilde has built much of her mystique on the premise that nothing fuels desire like the unattainable – particularly when the something in question is an attractive married woman.
Deadline reports that the recently divorced actress has landed a part that plays on just that theme, beating out a long line of hopefuls for the role of '70s supermodel Suzy Miller in Ron Howard's 'Rush.'
The movie tells the story of the intensely competitive relationship between Formula One drivers James Hunt and Niki Lauda, as well as Hunt's equally complex, yet far more scandalous relationship with Miller.
The model ended her marriage to Hunt after only 14 months when she found herself, like so many other women at the time, getting a lady boner for her husband's close friend, actor Richard Burton. Of course, allegations that Hunt had bedded an impressive 5,000 women, many of them during his marriage,...
Deadline reports that the recently divorced actress has landed a part that plays on just that theme, beating out a long line of hopefuls for the role of '70s supermodel Suzy Miller in Ron Howard's 'Rush.'
The movie tells the story of the intensely competitive relationship between Formula One drivers James Hunt and Niki Lauda, as well as Hunt's equally complex, yet far more scandalous relationship with Miller.
The model ended her marriage to Hunt after only 14 months when she found herself, like so many other women at the time, getting a lady boner for her husband's close friend, actor Richard Burton. Of course, allegations that Hunt had bedded an impressive 5,000 women, many of them during his marriage,...
- 10/4/2011
- by Sarah Crow
- NextMovie
The actress has enjoyed a decent year in the movies with Cowboys & Aliens and The Change-Up this past summer and In Time still coming later this month, and now Olivia Wilde has lined up a new project. While a whole slew of actresses apparently wanted the role, Deadline says it's Wilde who has been set to play 70's supermodel Suzy Miller in Ron Howard's Rush, the chronicle of the rivalry between the late playboy British Formula One driver James Hunt and his nemesis, Austrian champion Niki Lauda. There might even be a small role that would reunite Howard with his A Beautiful Mind star Russell Crowe as well. More below! Miller became quite fond of Hunt who is described as a handsome, womanizing racer, but the story will also show how the model soon came to fall in love with Richard Burton, and that's the role that Howard is...
- 10/4/2011
- by Ethan Anderton
- firstshowing.net
Olivia Wilde may be joining the Ron Howard-directed racing drama "Rush," starring Chris Hemsworth ("Thor") and Daniel Bruhl ("Inglourious Basterds"). The film will depict the real-life competition between Formula One drivers Niki Lauda (Bruhl) and James Hunt (Hemsworth). Wilde would co-star as '70s supermodel Suzy Miller. Miller and Hunt were married until Miller fell for Hunt’s close friend, actor and former husband of Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton. Deadline.com also reports that Howard is looking to cast Russell Crowe as Burton. Crowe and Howard collaborated on 2001's Oscar-winning "A Beautiful Mind" and 2005's "Cinderella Man." Peter Morgan ("The Queen," "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier,...
- 10/4/2011
- by HitFix Staff
- Hitfix
Cowboys & Aliens producer Ron Howard reportedly is cherry-picking from Jon Favreau.s sci-fi cast to fill a crucial role in his upcoming Formula-1 drama Rush, which will recount the rivalry between F1 champions James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Niki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl). Olivia Wilde, who played a mysterious frontierswoman tracking her missing kin in Aliens, could be tapped to play supermodel Suzy Miller in Howard.s film, according to Deadline. Miller, at the time of this story, fell for and married Hunt when he was at the peak of his profession. Their romance was short-lived, however, as the stunning beauty eventually fell for Hollywood icon Richard Burton. As legend has it, Burton forked over $1 million for a divorce settlement between Hunt and Miller, and the actor married the model shortly after. Here.s where things get interesting. Deadline adds that Howard would like Russell Crowe to play Burton in the...
- 10/4/2011
- cinemablend.com
When Robert Duvall landed a role in One Shot that was accompanied with a vague description, some began to assume that he would be playing the villain of the piece. Turns out that someone else has this part — and it’s the last person you’d expect. As Variety informs us, the main antagonist to go up against Tom Cruise is none other than legendary German filmmaker Werner Herzog.
I’ll just assume that everyone reading this knows who he is — or is at least familiar with his now-trademark voice — so I can just say that this is a peculiar choice. Herzog has never had a major acting role before, with most of his performances being restricted to minor work in Harmony Korine movies. For him to really start in a Tom Cruise thriller — it’s odd; but also wonderful. Writer and director Christopher McQuarrie has wanted to work with him for some time,...
I’ll just assume that everyone reading this knows who he is — or is at least familiar with his now-trademark voice — so I can just say that this is a peculiar choice. Herzog has never had a major acting role before, with most of his performances being restricted to minor work in Harmony Korine movies. For him to really start in a Tom Cruise thriller — it’s odd; but also wonderful. Writer and director Christopher McQuarrie has wanted to work with him for some time,...
- 10/4/2011
- by jpraup@gmail.com (thefilmstage.com)
- The Film Stage
Olivia Wilde ("Tron: Legacy," "Cowboys and Aliens") will play 1970s supermodel Suzy Miller in Ron Howard's "Rush" at Cross Creek Pictures, Working Title and Imagine reports Deadline.
Peter Morgan's script follows the rivalry between Austrian racer Niki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl) and British racer James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) on the Formula One circuit in the 70's. Lauda nearly died in a fiery crash in 1976 but returned to the track just six weeks later to race Hunt.
Miller fell in love with and married the handsome, womanizing Hunt but soon after her affections turned toward his friend - actor Richard Burton. Eventually Burton paid the $1 million divorce settlement that Hunt owed Miller, Burton and Miller were married shortly after.
Howard reportedly wants Crowe to play Burton in the film which is essentially little more than a cameo. Howard, Brian Grazer, Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner and Brian Oliver will produce.
Peter Morgan's script follows the rivalry between Austrian racer Niki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl) and British racer James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) on the Formula One circuit in the 70's. Lauda nearly died in a fiery crash in 1976 but returned to the track just six weeks later to race Hunt.
Miller fell in love with and married the handsome, womanizing Hunt but soon after her affections turned toward his friend - actor Richard Burton. Eventually Burton paid the $1 million divorce settlement that Hunt owed Miller, Burton and Miller were married shortly after.
Howard reportedly wants Crowe to play Burton in the film which is essentially little more than a cameo. Howard, Brian Grazer, Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner and Brian Oliver will produce.
- 10/4/2011
- by Garth Franklin
- Dark Horizons
Filed under: Movie News
The streak of big-budget Olivia Wilde roles continue. After appearing in 'Cowboys & Aliens' and 'Tron: Legacy' (and 'The Change-Up; nobody's perfect), the actress will play supermodel Suzy Miller in the Ron Howard-directed 'Rush.' Based on a true story, the film focuses on the rivalry between two Formula One racecar drivers Niki Lauda ('Inglourious Basterds' star Daniel Bruhl) and James Hunt ('Thor' star Chris Hemsworth). Miller eventually married Hunt, however, she would soon fall in love with actor Richard Burton. Speaking of Burton, there is a rumor that Russell Crowe could cameo as the iconic actor. No word on when 'Rush' will hit theaters. [Deadline]
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The streak of big-budget Olivia Wilde roles continue. After appearing in 'Cowboys & Aliens' and 'Tron: Legacy' (and 'The Change-Up; nobody's perfect), the actress will play supermodel Suzy Miller in the Ron Howard-directed 'Rush.' Based on a true story, the film focuses on the rivalry between two Formula One racecar drivers Niki Lauda ('Inglourious Basterds' star Daniel Bruhl) and James Hunt ('Thor' star Chris Hemsworth). Miller eventually married Hunt, however, she would soon fall in love with actor Richard Burton. Speaking of Burton, there is a rumor that Russell Crowe could cameo as the iconic actor. No word on when 'Rush' will hit theaters. [Deadline]
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- 10/4/2011
- by Alex Suskind
- Moviefone
Olivia Wilde has joined the cast of Ron Howard's next, Rush , Deadline reports. She will play supermodel Suzy Miller in the Formula 1 biopic opposite Chris Hemsworth and Daniel Brühl. Whats more, Russell Crowe is also said to be up for a cameo part, playing actor Richard Burton. The film, which began shooting last month , features a script from Peter Morgan ( Frost/Nixon , The Queen ) and is officially described as follows: Set against the 1970's golden age of Formula 1 racing, "Rush" portrays the fast-paced and exhilarating true story of two of the greatest rivalries the sport has ever witnessed . that of James Hunt (Hemsworth) and Niki Lauda (Brühl) and their illustrious Formula 1 racing teams, McLaren and Ferrari. A privileged, charismatic and handsome English...
- 10/4/2011
- Comingsoon.net
Breaking: Universal Pictures has made a three-year deal to distribute at least six pictures produced and funded by Cross Creek Pictures. The first film in this deal will be Rush, the Ron Howard-directed Formula One drama. Cross Creek, run by president Brian Oliver and CEO Timmy Thompson, has quickly emerged as a significant film financier. They got started with the Darren Aronofsky-directed Black Swan and continue with the upcoming George Clooney-directed The Ides of March and Daniel Radcliffe-starrer The Woman in Black, which will be distributed by CBS Films. The deal was announced by Universal Pictures chairman Adam Fogelson and co-chairman Donna Langley, along with Oliver and Thompson. Cross Creek is partnered with Exclusive Media Group as co-financier and co-producer of Rush, the Howard-directed drama about the battle between ’70s Formula One racers Niki Lauda and James Hunt that stars Thor‘s Chris Hemsworth and Inglourious Basterds‘ Daniel Bruhl.
- 9/28/2011
- by MIKE FLEMING
- Deadline
In a country where the most successful movie about car racing is satire Talladega Nights, diving into the Formula 1 racing series, virtually non-existent in the eyes of America, with a serious movie about two of its leading men may not be the most well-advised idea. Nonetheless, legendary director Ron Howard is taking that risk along with financiers Cross Creek and Exclusive Media Group, producing alongside an army of others including Howard and Brian Grazer. Rush will take a look at James Hunt and Niki Lauda, Formula 1.s most well known rivals in the 1970s, as they climb the ranks and eventually find themselves regularly battling for wins on the track. Set to star is Thor himself Chris Hemsworth who we.re going to be seeing quite a bit more of so get used to him, and Daniel Bruhl, a rising star in his own right, spending a lot of his...
- 9/12/2011
- cinemablend.com
Production kicked off today on "Rush", Ron Howard’s Formula 1 film which is being co-produced by Cross Creek Pictures, Exclusive Media Group, Imagine Entertainment, Working Title and Revolution Films.
Set against the 1970’s golden age of Formula 1 racing, Rush portrays the fast-paced and exhilarating true story of two of the greatest rivalries the sport has ever witnessed – that of James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Niki Lauda (Daniel Brühl) and their illustrious Formula 1 racing teams, McLaren and Ferrari. A privileged, charismatic and handsome English playboy, Hunt could not be more different from his reserved and methodical opponent, Austrian born Lauda.
Rush follows their personal lives both on and off the track and charts their rivalry from its inception in Formula 3. Here they competed viciously against each other until Lauda’s business acumen and surgeon like precision behind the wheel propelled him all the way to Formula 1; eventually landing him the number one spot at Ferrari.
Set against the 1970’s golden age of Formula 1 racing, Rush portrays the fast-paced and exhilarating true story of two of the greatest rivalries the sport has ever witnessed – that of James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Niki Lauda (Daniel Brühl) and their illustrious Formula 1 racing teams, McLaren and Ferrari. A privileged, charismatic and handsome English playboy, Hunt could not be more different from his reserved and methodical opponent, Austrian born Lauda.
Rush follows their personal lives both on and off the track and charts their rivalry from its inception in Formula 3. Here they competed viciously against each other until Lauda’s business acumen and surgeon like precision behind the wheel propelled him all the way to Formula 1; eventually landing him the number one spot at Ferrari.
- 9/10/2011
- by Garth Franklin
- Dark Horizons
Ron Howard’s Rush To Begin Shooting This Weekend
Ron Howard's race-car biopic Rush, the story of Formula 1 driver Niki Lauda, will begin shooting this weekend. Ron Howard picked up the film after his passion project, The Dark Tower, which was going to star Javier Bardem, was shelved. Rush focuses largely on Lauda's relationship with fellow Formula 1 driver, James Hunt, and the rivalry that grew between the two drivers.
Thanks for reading We Got This Covered...
Ron Howard's race-car biopic Rush, the story of Formula 1 driver Niki Lauda, will begin shooting this weekend. Ron Howard picked up the film after his passion project, The Dark Tower, which was going to star Javier Bardem, was shelved. Rush focuses largely on Lauda's relationship with fellow Formula 1 driver, James Hunt, and the rivalry that grew between the two drivers.
Thanks for reading We Got This Covered...
- 9/7/2011
- by Blake Dew
- We Got This Covered
Gentleman, start your engines. Director Ron Howard can't officially start filming his historical Formula One film Rush until star Chris Hemsworth finishes The Avengers, but the director will be at the Nurburgring Race Track in Germany this weekend getting some early footage to use in the film. Both Hemsworth and co-star Daniel Brühl will be on hand as cars from the film's 1970s time period blaze around the track helping to tell the story of legendary racers James Hunt and Niki Lauda. We'll explain the story and what's being filmed early after the jump. Deadline broke the news of the early shoot on the film which focuses on the heated rivalry between Hunt and Lauda that culminated in a battle for the world championship in 1976. The Nurburgring track plays a pivotal role in the story as its the track where Lauda set several records and eventually crashed his own car...
- 9/6/2011
- by Germain Lussier
- Slash Film
The director is to film a pilot of the boxer's life for HBO. What other sports stars' stories would make good TV?
American premium cable channel HBO has commissioned film director Spike Lee to make a pilot for a series based on the life of heavyweight boxer Mike Tyson.
Da Brick will reflect aspects of Tyson's New Jersey upbringing and early career and is said to be a boxing equivalent to Entourage, whose creator Doug Ellin is also involved in the project. South London newcomer John Boyega, whose only previous role was as Moses in Joe Cornish's Attack the Block, has been cast as the main character.
A boxing drama is a good fit for HBO, which built its audience on world-title fights going as far back as 1975, when the channel screened the Ali v Frazier "Thrilla In Manilla" via satellite in the Us. It does however beg...
American premium cable channel HBO has commissioned film director Spike Lee to make a pilot for a series based on the life of heavyweight boxer Mike Tyson.
Da Brick will reflect aspects of Tyson's New Jersey upbringing and early career and is said to be a boxing equivalent to Entourage, whose creator Doug Ellin is also involved in the project. South London newcomer John Boyega, whose only previous role was as Moses in Joe Cornish's Attack the Block, has been cast as the main character.
A boxing drama is a good fit for HBO, which built its audience on world-title fights going as far back as 1975, when the channel screened the Ali v Frazier "Thrilla In Manilla" via satellite in the Us. It does however beg...
- 9/1/2011
- by Johnny Dee
- The Guardian - Film News
Sky have made a determined effort this year to finance brand new and diverse original shows that they can showcase on Sky 1 and Sky Arts, seemingly because their recent HBO deal cost them a sizeable wad of cash to form Sky Atlantic, and they are getting the idea it might be cheaper in the long run to create their own UK style of HBO.
The results? A shocking array of cliched British television, at least so far, that are closer to third-rate ITV sitcoms than anything that will become mainstays of television. We certainly commend Sky for looking at new British talent, greenlighting shows that other networks aren’t but why put money into the Asada-style sitcom Trollied (which we tore apart here) when they should be looking for the next comedy giants like Ricky Gervais or sitcoms like Peep Show/The It Crowd or the new Inbetweeners/Skins and...
The results? A shocking array of cliched British television, at least so far, that are closer to third-rate ITV sitcoms than anything that will become mainstays of television. We certainly commend Sky for looking at new British talent, greenlighting shows that other networks aren’t but why put money into the Asada-style sitcom Trollied (which we tore apart here) when they should be looking for the next comedy giants like Ricky Gervais or sitcoms like Peep Show/The It Crowd or the new Inbetweeners/Skins and...
- 8/26/2011
- by Matt Holmes
- Obsessed with Film
With only three months of filming left for "The Dark Knight Rises," the world is Christian Bale's oyster. The Oscar-winning actor currently doesn't have any films lined up once the final installment of Christopher Nolan's Batman movies wraps, but he certainly does have options.
Variety is reporting that he has five films that he could potentially join, though he's not attached to any of them yet and none are considered front-runners at this point.
The first is in the Beyonce-starring remake of "A Star is Born," which is being directed by Clint Eastwood. There's also Michael Mann's "Gold," Scott Cooper's "Out of the Furnace," Spike Lee's "Old Boy" remake and Darren Aronofsky's biblical epic "Noah." Bale is in the prime of his career right now, so any of those options would be a good one. It will be interesting to see what direction...
Variety is reporting that he has five films that he could potentially join, though he's not attached to any of them yet and none are considered front-runners at this point.
The first is in the Beyonce-starring remake of "A Star is Born," which is being directed by Clint Eastwood. There's also Michael Mann's "Gold," Scott Cooper's "Out of the Furnace," Spike Lee's "Old Boy" remake and Darren Aronofsky's biblical epic "Noah." Bale is in the prime of his career right now, so any of those options would be a good one. It will be interesting to see what direction...
- 8/24/2011
- by Terri Schwartz
- MTV Movies Blog
German actress Alexandra Maria Lara has booked the female lead in Ron Howard's racing film "Rush."According to Variety, Howard is directing from a Peter Morgan script.The film centers on the real-life 1970s rivalry between Formula One race car drivers James Hunt and Niki Lauda.Chris Hemsworth ("Thor") will play the British racer Hunt.Daniel Brühl ("Inglourious Basterds") will play the Austrian racer Lauda.Brian Grazer and Howard are producing through their Imagine shingle along with Working Title's Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner; and Cross Creek's Brian Oliver.Universal will likely distribute the film.Lara's credits include "Downfall," "Youth Without Youth," "Miracle at St. Anna" and "The Reader."...
- 8/24/2011
- by Adnan Tezer
- Monsters and Critics
Alexandra Maria Lara (Downfall) has landed the lead female role in Rush, The Playlist have confirmed.
The rising actress will star opposite Chris Hemsworth (Thor) and Daniel Brühl (Inglourious Basterds) in the racing film.
Written by acclaimed screenwriter Peter Morgan (The Last King of Scotland), Rush centers on Austrian Niki Lauda’s (Brühl) rivalry with English racer James Hunt (Hemsworth).
Ron Howard (A Beautiful Mind), whose ambitious The Dark Tower was recently delayed indefinitely by Universal, is attached to direct.
Filming is expected to begin early next year.
The rising actress will star opposite Chris Hemsworth (Thor) and Daniel Brühl (Inglourious Basterds) in the racing film.
Written by acclaimed screenwriter Peter Morgan (The Last King of Scotland), Rush centers on Austrian Niki Lauda’s (Brühl) rivalry with English racer James Hunt (Hemsworth).
Ron Howard (A Beautiful Mind), whose ambitious The Dark Tower was recently delayed indefinitely by Universal, is attached to direct.
Filming is expected to begin early next year.
- 8/23/2011
- by Jamie Neish
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
The two lead roles in Alex Proyas‘ Paradise Lost have been set for Bradley Cooper (who’s playing Lucifer) and Benjamin Walker (who’s playing Michael), but another major part has been cast. ShowBlitz says that Djimon Hounsou is boarding the film, in the part of the angel of death, Abdiel.
In John Milton‘s original poem, Abdiel went to tell God of Lucifer’s actions, and he also participated in the final battle, where he did some smiting. Perhaps most importantly, some have speculated that the character serves as an autobiographical piece of work on the author’s part; anyone think Proyas will do the same? (That’s just a joke.) Hounsou is a strong, intense actor, and I think that he’ll fit this part rather convincingly. Plus, it should help break the bad streak he’s had lately, which included things like Never Back Down and Push...
In John Milton‘s original poem, Abdiel went to tell God of Lucifer’s actions, and he also participated in the final battle, where he did some smiting. Perhaps most importantly, some have speculated that the character serves as an autobiographical piece of work on the author’s part; anyone think Proyas will do the same? (That’s just a joke.) Hounsou is a strong, intense actor, and I think that he’ll fit this part rather convincingly. Plus, it should help break the bad streak he’s had lately, which included things like Never Back Down and Push...
- 8/22/2011
- by jpraup@gmail.com (thefilmstage.com)
- The Film Stage
Whilst Ron Howard is still hoping to get The Dark Tower off the ground with lead star Javier Bardem apparently still attached (though it looks like wishful thinking to us), the Oscar winning director is stepping up a gear on his next picture, the racing drama Rush.
Scripted by The Queen and Frost/Nixon writer Peter Morgan, the movie is based on the life of Formula 1 racer Niki Lauda and his near-fatal 1976 racing season which coincided with the rivalry he and Englishman racer James Hunt shared. In a significant coup, Howard attached Thor actor Chris Hemsworth for the James Hunt role earlier this year with Inglourious Basterds actor Daniel Bruhl set as the Austrian racer Lauda.
Variety updates us on the project today with the news that German actress Alexanda Maria Lara, who I know best as Hitler’s sympathetic new secretary in Downfall but who has also appeared in The Reader,...
Scripted by The Queen and Frost/Nixon writer Peter Morgan, the movie is based on the life of Formula 1 racer Niki Lauda and his near-fatal 1976 racing season which coincided with the rivalry he and Englishman racer James Hunt shared. In a significant coup, Howard attached Thor actor Chris Hemsworth for the James Hunt role earlier this year with Inglourious Basterds actor Daniel Bruhl set as the Austrian racer Lauda.
Variety updates us on the project today with the news that German actress Alexanda Maria Lara, who I know best as Hitler’s sympathetic new secretary in Downfall but who has also appeared in The Reader,...
- 8/22/2011
- by Matt Holmes
- Obsessed with Film
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