Between 1959 and 1964, there wasn't a more consistently brilliant show on television than Rod Serling's "The Twilight Zone" — an accomplishment that's all the more amazing given its anthology concept. Every episode offered a completely new story, often in a completely different genre, from an occasionally different writer. Sure, the rotating staff was a murderer's row of scribes that included Serling, Richard Matheson, and Charles Beaumont, but, good as they were, they didn't have the safety net of writing for the same characters every time out. All they had was their imagination.
Considering Hollywood's risk-averse nature, it's a little surprising that more "Twilight Zone" episodes haven't been turned into full-blown features — at least, not as official remakes. Obviously, "Poltergeist" owes a massive creative debt to "Little Girl Lost" and it's hard to imagine "Child's Play" without the arsenic-laced genius of "Living Doll," but for straight-up adaptations there's Richard Kelly's "The Box...
Considering Hollywood's risk-averse nature, it's a little surprising that more "Twilight Zone" episodes haven't been turned into full-blown features — at least, not as official remakes. Obviously, "Poltergeist" owes a massive creative debt to "Little Girl Lost" and it's hard to imagine "Child's Play" without the arsenic-laced genius of "Living Doll," but for straight-up adaptations there's Richard Kelly's "The Box...
- 12/28/2023
- by Jeremy Smith
- Slash Film
On the JoBlo Movies YouTube channel, we will be posting one full movie every day of the week, giving viewers the chance to watch them entirely free of charge. Today’s Free Movie of the Day is the 2008 comedy The Deal, starring William H. Macy and Meg Ryan. You can watch it over on the YouTube channel linked above, or you can just watch it in the embed at the top of this article.
Based on a novel by Peter Lecourt, The Deal was directed by Steven Schachter, who also wrote the screenplay with Macy. The film has the following synopsis: A down-and-out film producer agrees to make his nephew’s film about 19th century English statesman Benjamin Disraeli, but can only get financing if he casts a well-known action star. Production is halted however, when the lead actor is kidnapped, so the producer hatches a scheme with a struggling...
Based on a novel by Peter Lecourt, The Deal was directed by Steven Schachter, who also wrote the screenplay with Macy. The film has the following synopsis: A down-and-out film producer agrees to make his nephew’s film about 19th century English statesman Benjamin Disraeli, but can only get financing if he casts a well-known action star. Production is halted however, when the lead actor is kidnapped, so the producer hatches a scheme with a struggling...
- 2/24/2023
- by Cody Hamman
- JoBlo.com
Christopher Reeve: 'Superman' and his movies (photo: Christopher Reeve in 'Superman' 1978) Christopher Reeve, Superman in four movies from 1978 to 1987, died ten years ago today. In 1995, while taking part in a cross-country horse race in Culpeper, Virginia, Reeve was thrown off his horse, hitting his head on the top rail of a jump; the near-fatal accident left him paralyzed from the neck down. He ultimately succumbed to heart failure at age 52 on October 10, 2004. Long before he was cast as Superman aka Clark Kent, the Manhattan-born (as Christopher D'Olier Reeve on September 25, 1952), Cornell University and Juillard School for Drama alumnus was an ambitious young actor whose theatrical apprenticeship included, while still a teenager, some time as an observer at London's Old Vic and Paris' Comédie Française. At age 23, he landed his first Broadway role in a production of Enid Bagnold's A Matter of Gravity, starring Katharine Hepburn.
- 10/11/2014
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
I'm not reviewing "Shameless" every week, but tonight's episode was particularly strong, and I have some thoughts on it coming up just as soon as I'm married, but only legally... "Can I Have a Mother" was co-written (with Steven Schachter) by William H. Macy. I have no idea if Macy pays any reaction at all to reviews of this show (most, but not all, of which single Frank out as the show's weakest link) and wanted this script to do some damage control and make Frank more sympathetic, but it certainly worked out that way. We got a brief glimpse of...
- 2/13/2012
- by Alan Sepinwall
- Hitfix
Jody Kielbasa has joined the University of Virginia's College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences as the new director of the Virginia Film Festival, which runs from Nov. 5-8 in Charlottesville, Va.
He succeeds Richard Herskowitz, who stepped down in November after 15 years as artistic director.
"We're thrilled to have Jody on board in this capacity," said Arts & Sciences associate dean Bruce Holsinger, who chaired the search committee. "The Film Festival plays a significant role in the College's arts community, and Jody Kielbasa is the ideal leader at this exciting time for arts at U.Va. more broadly."
For the past decade, Kielbasa served as the founding executive director of the Sarasota Film Festival in Sarasota, Fla. He also recently co-produced the independent film "The Deal," starring William H. Macy and Meg Ryan and directed by Steven Schachter.
He succeeds Richard Herskowitz, who stepped down in November after 15 years as artistic director.
"We're thrilled to have Jody on board in this capacity," said Arts & Sciences associate dean Bruce Holsinger, who chaired the search committee. "The Film Festival plays a significant role in the College's arts community, and Jody Kielbasa is the ideal leader at this exciting time for arts at U.Va. more broadly."
For the past decade, Kielbasa served as the founding executive director of the Sarasota Film Festival in Sarasota, Fla. He also recently co-produced the independent film "The Deal," starring William H. Macy and Meg Ryan and directed by Steven Schachter.
- 5/26/2009
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Rapper/actor Jj Cool J will star in an offshoot of CBS's "NCIS" where he'll apparently play a tough and charming former Navy Seal who works undercover for the NCIS Unit in La and is an expert on the Middle East. This will air as one half of a two-part episode of "NCIS" later this season. "NCIS" showrunner Shane Brennan created the show which yet has to be titled and will serve as an and executive producer for CBS Paramount Network TV. LL Cool J was last seen in Steven Schachter's comedy "The Deal" alongside William H. Macy, Meg Ryan, Elliot Gould and Jason Ritter. ...
- 2/25/2009
- Upcoming-Movies.com
By Michael Atkinson
The DVD era has been very generous to low-grade biodocs focused on culty, semi-obscure pop wonders -- everyone from the Holy Moly Rounders to Roky Erickson, Benjamin Smoke, Townes Van Zandt, Gary Wilson, Joy Division, They Might Be Giants, Scott Walker, et cetera, have received their official, devotional, feature-length eulogy. Graveside homilies they are, too, there's little point in denying it -- for the aging musicians of the '60s, '70s and '80s as well as for our long-lost younger selves, now only faint traces of remembered élan, hope and indestructibility. Of course, Patti Smith, like Leonard Cohen and the Ramones (so nicely requiem-ed in 2003's "End of the Century"), is far from little known, but she still occupies that musty corner of pop legend-dom: more admired than listened to, known for her history more than her songs, aging into a kind of marginal retro-hipness...
The DVD era has been very generous to low-grade biodocs focused on culty, semi-obscure pop wonders -- everyone from the Holy Moly Rounders to Roky Erickson, Benjamin Smoke, Townes Van Zandt, Gary Wilson, Joy Division, They Might Be Giants, Scott Walker, et cetera, have received their official, devotional, feature-length eulogy. Graveside homilies they are, too, there's little point in denying it -- for the aging musicians of the '60s, '70s and '80s as well as for our long-lost younger selves, now only faint traces of remembered élan, hope and indestructibility. Of course, Patti Smith, like Leonard Cohen and the Ramones (so nicely requiem-ed in 2003's "End of the Century"), is far from little known, but she still occupies that musty corner of pop legend-dom: more admired than listened to, known for her history more than her songs, aging into a kind of marginal retro-hipness...
- 1/27/2009
- by Michael Atkinson
- ifc.com
Sundance Film Festival
PARK CITY -- Hollywood satires are always an iffy proposition. They can often seem too insular and inbred to capture a general audience. Yet there are classics in the genre, going back to "Singin' in the Rain." And the HBO hit series "Entourage" offers a lot of wickedly funny insider insights. But "The Deal", which had its world premiere here, is a wacky Hollywood satire that never catches fire.
The film began with a novel by Peter Lefcourt, who once toiled in Hollywood himself and has recently become better known as a novelist. But this is one of those outrageous comic tales that probably worked better on the page. When something is translated to the more literal medium of film, it needs a minimal grounding in reality, which this film lacks.
Here's the premise: Charlie Berns (William H. Macy) is a has-been producer on the verge of suicide when his nephew (Jason Ritter) comes knocking on his door with a new script based on the life of Benjamin Disraeli, the long-ago British prime minister. Sounds like a hard sell, but it turns out that Hollywood's top black action star, Bobby Mason (LL Cool J), has recently converted to Judaism and is seeking movies with Jewish themes.
The story of Disraeli might not seem like the easiest fit for Bobby, but Charlie has the idea of revamping and modernizing it. So it turns into "Ben Disraeli, Freedom Fighter", which allows for plenty of mayhem along with Hebrew blessings for the star to deliver while he kicks butt.
On paper, the story might sound amusing, but it is so far-fetched that we never buy into a minute of it. This might have been a lesser problem if the script were wittier, but the laughs are very intermittent, to put it kindly, and so we are left to contemplate the unlikeliness of all the plot developments. The film bears some resemblance to Steve Martin's "Bowfinger", another film about a failed producer trying to get into business with a successful black movie star. But that film, while equally far-fetched, was sidesplittingly funny thanks to splendid writing and acting.
Nothing seems even remotely plausible in "The Deal", which has been adapted by Macy and director Steven Schachter, long-term pals who worked together on several acclaimed television movies. The script's implausibility carries over to the central relationship between Charlie and a savvy studio executive, Deidre Hearn (Meg Ryan).
At first, Deidre is understandably skeptical of Charlie, but when she learns that her studio has been sold to a Canadian company, she gets drunk and jumps into bed with Charlie, a leap that is almost impossible to accept. But even small plot points defy credibility. When a studio suit arrives to shut down the production, Charlie decides to distract him with a hooker. We can accept that she might delay his visit to the set for three hours, but three days?
Macy does bring a lot of energy to his role, and Ryan also gives a shrewd performance when the script doesn't ask her to behave improbably. Most of the supporting players are rather flat, but Elliott Gould has an amusing cameo as Bobby's rabbi, hired as an associate producer on the film.
Much of the film was shot in South Africa, where the film-within-the-film goes to save money. No doubt that was the same reason for the location work on "The Deal". Technical credits are strong. Boxoffice prospects are dim.
THE DEAL
Peace Arch Entertainment
Muse Entertainment
Credits:
Director: Steven Schachter
Screenwriters: William H. Macy, Steven Schachter
Based on the novel by: Peter Lefcourt
Producers: Michael Prupas, Irene Litinsky, Keri Nakamoto
Executive producers: Gary Howsam, Lewin Webb, Jason Bark, Matt Lane
Director of photography: Paul Sarossy
Production designer: Guy Lalande
Music: Jeff Beal
Editors: Matthew Friedman, Susan Maggi
Cast:
Charlie Berns: William H. Macy
Deidre Hearn: Meg Ryan
Bobby Mason: LL Cool J
Lionel Travitz: Jason Ritter
Rabbi Seth Gutterman: Elliott Gould
Fiona Hicks: Fiona Glascott
Levi Rosenwald: Sharon Reginiano
Nigel Bland: John Carson
Grier Clark: David Hunt
Ian Chadwick: Jeremy Crutchley
Running time -- 98 minutes
No MPAA rating...
PARK CITY -- Hollywood satires are always an iffy proposition. They can often seem too insular and inbred to capture a general audience. Yet there are classics in the genre, going back to "Singin' in the Rain." And the HBO hit series "Entourage" offers a lot of wickedly funny insider insights. But "The Deal", which had its world premiere here, is a wacky Hollywood satire that never catches fire.
The film began with a novel by Peter Lefcourt, who once toiled in Hollywood himself and has recently become better known as a novelist. But this is one of those outrageous comic tales that probably worked better on the page. When something is translated to the more literal medium of film, it needs a minimal grounding in reality, which this film lacks.
Here's the premise: Charlie Berns (William H. Macy) is a has-been producer on the verge of suicide when his nephew (Jason Ritter) comes knocking on his door with a new script based on the life of Benjamin Disraeli, the long-ago British prime minister. Sounds like a hard sell, but it turns out that Hollywood's top black action star, Bobby Mason (LL Cool J), has recently converted to Judaism and is seeking movies with Jewish themes.
The story of Disraeli might not seem like the easiest fit for Bobby, but Charlie has the idea of revamping and modernizing it. So it turns into "Ben Disraeli, Freedom Fighter", which allows for plenty of mayhem along with Hebrew blessings for the star to deliver while he kicks butt.
On paper, the story might sound amusing, but it is so far-fetched that we never buy into a minute of it. This might have been a lesser problem if the script were wittier, but the laughs are very intermittent, to put it kindly, and so we are left to contemplate the unlikeliness of all the plot developments. The film bears some resemblance to Steve Martin's "Bowfinger", another film about a failed producer trying to get into business with a successful black movie star. But that film, while equally far-fetched, was sidesplittingly funny thanks to splendid writing and acting.
Nothing seems even remotely plausible in "The Deal", which has been adapted by Macy and director Steven Schachter, long-term pals who worked together on several acclaimed television movies. The script's implausibility carries over to the central relationship between Charlie and a savvy studio executive, Deidre Hearn (Meg Ryan).
At first, Deidre is understandably skeptical of Charlie, but when she learns that her studio has been sold to a Canadian company, she gets drunk and jumps into bed with Charlie, a leap that is almost impossible to accept. But even small plot points defy credibility. When a studio suit arrives to shut down the production, Charlie decides to distract him with a hooker. We can accept that she might delay his visit to the set for three hours, but three days?
Macy does bring a lot of energy to his role, and Ryan also gives a shrewd performance when the script doesn't ask her to behave improbably. Most of the supporting players are rather flat, but Elliott Gould has an amusing cameo as Bobby's rabbi, hired as an associate producer on the film.
Much of the film was shot in South Africa, where the film-within-the-film goes to save money. No doubt that was the same reason for the location work on "The Deal". Technical credits are strong. Boxoffice prospects are dim.
THE DEAL
Peace Arch Entertainment
Muse Entertainment
Credits:
Director: Steven Schachter
Screenwriters: William H. Macy, Steven Schachter
Based on the novel by: Peter Lefcourt
Producers: Michael Prupas, Irene Litinsky, Keri Nakamoto
Executive producers: Gary Howsam, Lewin Webb, Jason Bark, Matt Lane
Director of photography: Paul Sarossy
Production designer: Guy Lalande
Music: Jeff Beal
Editors: Matthew Friedman, Susan Maggi
Cast:
Charlie Berns: William H. Macy
Deidre Hearn: Meg Ryan
Bobby Mason: LL Cool J
Lionel Travitz: Jason Ritter
Rabbi Seth Gutterman: Elliott Gould
Fiona Hicks: Fiona Glascott
Levi Rosenwald: Sharon Reginiano
Nigel Bland: John Carson
Grier Clark: David Hunt
Ian Chadwick: Jeremy Crutchley
Running time -- 98 minutes
No MPAA rating...
- 1/25/2008
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
At the 2008 Sundance Film Festival, the gala Premieres, which used to take place in the chilly nighttime, will begin as early as 3 p.m. And there will be more Premieres than ever.
As the Sundance Institute announced the lineup of films screening out of competition at its 2008 edition, organizers said that the Premieres section has significantly expanded. This year, 24 films will play as galas, occupying the 3, 6 and 9:30 p.m. slots at the Eccles Theater in Park City, the festival's largest venue. By contrast, there were 17 Premieres at this year's Sundance.
Although he admitted he was tempted, festival director Geoffrey Gilmore said the size of Sundance has not expanded. The festival will again screen 121 feature films, which includes 81 world premieres. What organizers have done, director of programming John Cooper said, is to reposition films in the Spectrum category, which previously played in the 3 p.m. slot, into the Premiere section.
"These are films that deserve that (Premiere) position inside the Eccles," Cooper said.
The announcement rounds out the rest of the 2008 program, which includes Premieres, Spectrum, New Frontier and Park City at Midnight sections. The 2008 Sundance Film Festival runs Jan. 17-27 in Park City, Salt Lake City, Ogden and Sundance, Utah.
The Premieres section showcases highly anticipated films from the American indie world and from international filmmakers. Perhaps the two most highly anticipated films are music related.
Catherine Owens and Mark Pellington's 3-D film of U2's Vertigo world tour -- snippets of which were shown in May at the Festival de Cannes -- will be presented in its entirety. The only question is: What 3-D glasses will be used?
Gilmore said the festival must decide between two different kinds of glasses or goggles. "Either way, there will be a single projector putting a split film image on the screen that are read by the (3-D) goggles," he said.
This year's closing-night film will be the world premiere of Bernard Shakey's CSNY Deja Vu, which looks at the Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young reunion tour and the musicians' connection to its audience in political and musical terms. Young is credited as a co-writer on the project.
Pellington performs a twofer this year as his Henry Poole Is Here also is in the Premieres section. After discovering he has a mere six weeks to live, Henry Poole (Luke Wilson) retreats from his everyday life for the comfort of booze, junk food and solitude until a "miracle" and his oddball neighbors intervene.
Another person who will be doing Q&As more than once will be actress-director Amy Redford, daughter of Sundance Institute founder Robert Redford. As an actress, she stars in Sunshine Cleaning, an irreverent comedy that will play in Dramatic Competition. As a first-time director, she will present The Guitar, which like Henry Poole, centers on a person diagnosed with a terminal illness. Amos Poe's Guitar screenplay is about a woman (Saffron Burrows) without long to live who blows her savings to pursue her dreams.
Michel Gondry came to Sundance two years ago with his mind-blowing The Science of Sleep. He now returns with his Be Kind Rewind, in which Jack Black plays a man whose brain has become magnetized, leading to the unintentional destruction of all the movies in a friend's video store. In order to keep the store's one loyal customer, the pair re-create a long line of films including The Lion King, Rush Hour and Ghostbusters.
" 'Be Kind Rewind' will tax people's patience but has a wonderful payoff," Gilmore said.
As previously announced, the festival opens Jan. 17 in Park City with the world premiere of In Bruges, written and directed by first-time filmmaker and award-winning playwright Martin McDonagh. The film, which stars Ralph Fiennes, Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson, revolves around two hitmen ordered to take a forced holiday in Bruges, Belgium.
Two films about filmmaking should amuse the in-crowd. In Barry Levinson's What Just Happened? Robert De Niro plays a desperate producer struggling with a desperate film shoot. In Steven Schachter's The Deal, William H. Macy co-writes and stars in a tale about another similarly desperate producer who cons a studio into financing a film that actually has no script.
The tongue-in-cheek latter film "brings back Meg Ryan to the kind of romantic roles she plays so well," Gilmore said.
Premieres also is the section containing several films seen at earlier festivals such as writer-director Tom McCarthy's The Visitor and Alan Ball's Nothing Is Private -- movies that deal with immigrants in America -- which debuted at Toronto, and Tom Kalin's Savage Grace, which rocked Cannes with its themes of dynastic decline, incest, madness and death.
Sundance 2008 will throw an even brighter spotlight on documentaries by creating a sidebar within the Spectrum category for seven docus.
"The professional career of documentarians has changed dramatically," Gilmore said. "Documentaries were once a small world. Now it's a much broader spectrum of professionals and of people who move back and forth between features and documentaries, making films on subjects they are passionate about."
The Spectrum section also is where returning Sundance alums are to be found. To wit, Made in America by Stacy Peralta, who enjoyed a hit at the 2001 festival with Dogtown and Z-Boys; Blind Date from Stanley Tucci, who has come to Sundance with such interesting films as Big Night (1996) and Joe Gould's Secret (2000); August from Austin Chick, who made 2002's "XX/XY"; Baghead by writer-directors Mark and Jay Duplass, who brought Scrapple in 2004; and Bottle Shock, a retelling of the famous 1976 blind wine tasting in Paris that rocketed California wines to fame and glory, from Randall Miller, whose Marilyn Hotchkiss' Ballroom Dancing & Charm School played in 2005.
Park City at Midnight usually is the repository of the strange and the bloody. This year, though, Gilmore insisted, "the genre films are very fresh with a strong quality of execution."
Quentin Tarantino, absent from Park City for a few years, returns to "present" Larry Bishop's modern-day take on 1960s biker flicks, Hell Ride. A German-Canadian Midnight entry, Otto (Up With Dead People), is described by Gilmore as "an incredibly odd but interesting mix of gay zombies and a European setting."
The British Donkey Punch, named after a risky sexual practice, is a thriller that takes place aboard a luxury yacht. And Michael Haneke will bring Funny Games, an almost shot-by-shot remake of his 1997 Austrian chiller, only this time in English and in a Long Island setting.
As the Sundance Institute announced the lineup of films screening out of competition at its 2008 edition, organizers said that the Premieres section has significantly expanded. This year, 24 films will play as galas, occupying the 3, 6 and 9:30 p.m. slots at the Eccles Theater in Park City, the festival's largest venue. By contrast, there were 17 Premieres at this year's Sundance.
Although he admitted he was tempted, festival director Geoffrey Gilmore said the size of Sundance has not expanded. The festival will again screen 121 feature films, which includes 81 world premieres. What organizers have done, director of programming John Cooper said, is to reposition films in the Spectrum category, which previously played in the 3 p.m. slot, into the Premiere section.
"These are films that deserve that (Premiere) position inside the Eccles," Cooper said.
The announcement rounds out the rest of the 2008 program, which includes Premieres, Spectrum, New Frontier and Park City at Midnight sections. The 2008 Sundance Film Festival runs Jan. 17-27 in Park City, Salt Lake City, Ogden and Sundance, Utah.
The Premieres section showcases highly anticipated films from the American indie world and from international filmmakers. Perhaps the two most highly anticipated films are music related.
Catherine Owens and Mark Pellington's 3-D film of U2's Vertigo world tour -- snippets of which were shown in May at the Festival de Cannes -- will be presented in its entirety. The only question is: What 3-D glasses will be used?
Gilmore said the festival must decide between two different kinds of glasses or goggles. "Either way, there will be a single projector putting a split film image on the screen that are read by the (3-D) goggles," he said.
This year's closing-night film will be the world premiere of Bernard Shakey's CSNY Deja Vu, which looks at the Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young reunion tour and the musicians' connection to its audience in political and musical terms. Young is credited as a co-writer on the project.
Pellington performs a twofer this year as his Henry Poole Is Here also is in the Premieres section. After discovering he has a mere six weeks to live, Henry Poole (Luke Wilson) retreats from his everyday life for the comfort of booze, junk food and solitude until a "miracle" and his oddball neighbors intervene.
Another person who will be doing Q&As more than once will be actress-director Amy Redford, daughter of Sundance Institute founder Robert Redford. As an actress, she stars in Sunshine Cleaning, an irreverent comedy that will play in Dramatic Competition. As a first-time director, she will present The Guitar, which like Henry Poole, centers on a person diagnosed with a terminal illness. Amos Poe's Guitar screenplay is about a woman (Saffron Burrows) without long to live who blows her savings to pursue her dreams.
Michel Gondry came to Sundance two years ago with his mind-blowing The Science of Sleep. He now returns with his Be Kind Rewind, in which Jack Black plays a man whose brain has become magnetized, leading to the unintentional destruction of all the movies in a friend's video store. In order to keep the store's one loyal customer, the pair re-create a long line of films including The Lion King, Rush Hour and Ghostbusters.
" 'Be Kind Rewind' will tax people's patience but has a wonderful payoff," Gilmore said.
As previously announced, the festival opens Jan. 17 in Park City with the world premiere of In Bruges, written and directed by first-time filmmaker and award-winning playwright Martin McDonagh. The film, which stars Ralph Fiennes, Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson, revolves around two hitmen ordered to take a forced holiday in Bruges, Belgium.
Two films about filmmaking should amuse the in-crowd. In Barry Levinson's What Just Happened? Robert De Niro plays a desperate producer struggling with a desperate film shoot. In Steven Schachter's The Deal, William H. Macy co-writes and stars in a tale about another similarly desperate producer who cons a studio into financing a film that actually has no script.
The tongue-in-cheek latter film "brings back Meg Ryan to the kind of romantic roles she plays so well," Gilmore said.
Premieres also is the section containing several films seen at earlier festivals such as writer-director Tom McCarthy's The Visitor and Alan Ball's Nothing Is Private -- movies that deal with immigrants in America -- which debuted at Toronto, and Tom Kalin's Savage Grace, which rocked Cannes with its themes of dynastic decline, incest, madness and death.
Sundance 2008 will throw an even brighter spotlight on documentaries by creating a sidebar within the Spectrum category for seven docus.
"The professional career of documentarians has changed dramatically," Gilmore said. "Documentaries were once a small world. Now it's a much broader spectrum of professionals and of people who move back and forth between features and documentaries, making films on subjects they are passionate about."
The Spectrum section also is where returning Sundance alums are to be found. To wit, Made in America by Stacy Peralta, who enjoyed a hit at the 2001 festival with Dogtown and Z-Boys; Blind Date from Stanley Tucci, who has come to Sundance with such interesting films as Big Night (1996) and Joe Gould's Secret (2000); August from Austin Chick, who made 2002's "XX/XY"; Baghead by writer-directors Mark and Jay Duplass, who brought Scrapple in 2004; and Bottle Shock, a retelling of the famous 1976 blind wine tasting in Paris that rocketed California wines to fame and glory, from Randall Miller, whose Marilyn Hotchkiss' Ballroom Dancing & Charm School played in 2005.
Park City at Midnight usually is the repository of the strange and the bloody. This year, though, Gilmore insisted, "the genre films are very fresh with a strong quality of execution."
Quentin Tarantino, absent from Park City for a few years, returns to "present" Larry Bishop's modern-day take on 1960s biker flicks, Hell Ride. A German-Canadian Midnight entry, Otto (Up With Dead People), is described by Gilmore as "an incredibly odd but interesting mix of gay zombies and a European setting."
The British Donkey Punch, named after a risky sexual practice, is a thriller that takes place aboard a luxury yacht. And Michael Haneke will bring Funny Games, an almost shot-by-shot remake of his 1997 Austrian chiller, only this time in English and in a Long Island setting.
- 11/30/2007
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
- I expect my last day at the 08' edition of the Sundance film festival to end in the wee hours of the morning as the fest organizers have announced the make up of the Premieres section and have chosen documentary (Csny DÉJÀ Vu) on gray-haired legends of folk music (Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young) as the fest's closing feature.As predicted by yours truly, Michel Gondry will show up once again in Park City this time with the geek comedy preem Be Kind Rewind, while a number of high profile pics such as The Great Buck Howard, What Just Happened? and Diminished Capacity will have buyers lining up the block - the upcoming actors' strike is a reality and this has many mid level indie distributors looking to add to their slate. Up for grabs we also find films littered with talent: Irish import The Escapist, The Deal (a
- 11/29/2007
- IONCINEMA.com
Production Weekly reports that William H. Macy and Lisa Kudrow are set to star in the romantic comedy The Deal. Macy reunites with Door to Door director Steven Schacter to adapt Peter Lefcourt's tome about a Hollywood production in Europe that gose horribly wrong. Macy portrays a washed-up film producer who hooks up with a struggling creative exec (Kudrow) to save his plagued-riddled film. Shooting starts October 9 in Romania.
- 8/23/2006
- IMDbPro News
Oscar and Golden Globe winner Kim Basinger is set to make her TV movie debut in the Lifetime original movie The Mermaid Chair, based on the best-selling book by Sue Monk Kidd. In addition, Emmy winner Steven Schachter has come on board to direct the movie, which tells the story of Jessie Sullivan, a married woman who falls in love with a Benedictine monk and the crisis and self-awakening it ignites. Mermaid Chair will premiere on the cable network in September. "We are ecstatic to not only have the opportunity to bring this hugely popular novel to the small screen but to also have Kim Basinger star in this magical film," Lifetime senior vp original movies Trevor Walton said. "We feel this talented actress is the perfect woman to portray the complicated and soulful role of Jessie."...
William H. Macy and Steven Schachter, the Emmy-winning duo behind TNT's Door to Door, have teamed with Showtime for a movie based on the true story of a Florida accountant appointed by a judge to run a string of local strip clubs. Macy is set to play the certified public accountant, Lew Berman, with Schachter on board to direct the project, now in the development stage. The two will co-write the "quasi-real, quasi-fictional" script for the project tentatively dubbed The Accountant and the Stripper, Macy said. Added Schachter, "In the most basic scenario; it's a bit of a 'Rocky' story." Berman was put in charge of the clubs in 1996 by the judge who presided over a $17 million legal battle between Michael Peter, proprietor of the Nude chain of strip clubs, and a Jacksonville-based insurance executive, Mark Sanford. The $17 million was given to Peter by Sanford's insurance company in 1989 and never returned. Sanford claimed Peter defaulted on a loan, while Peter called it an investment that ended up losing money.
William H. Macy and Steven Schachter -- whose collaboration on TNT's Door to Door netted a total of six Emmy Awards last weekend -- are teaming again on the indie film Belle of Indiana with Keri Selig and her Intuition Prods. Macy is attached to star in the psychological thriller, with Schachter on board to helm from a script he co-wrote with Janet Faust. Set in rural Indiana during the early 1900s, the project centers on Belle, who is deserted by her husband, and Jennie, Belle's ward who is prone to wild behavior. After trying to run the farm on their own, the duo advertise for a male employee only to have an endless supply of handsome farmhands show up. However, the men soon end up disappearing one by one. Intuition's Selig will produce. She plans to take the project out to studios shortly with other cast attached.
- 9/29/2003
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
In a field that included such larger-than-life characters as Napoleon and Hitler, it was the touching story of a door-to-door salesman with cerebral palsy that topped the longform competition with 12 nominations, including best movie. The commercial and critical success of TNT's "Door to Door", about Portland, Ore.-based salesman Bill Porter, has come as a surprise for Willam H. Macy, nominated for his portrayal of Porter as well as for penning the script with his writing partner Steven Schachter. "I was surprised and gratified", Macy said. "It is very gratifying that it actually has moved people."...
- 7/17/2003
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
William H. Macy and Steven Schachter, the duo behind TNT/Johnson & Johnson's critical and commercial success Door to Door, are reteaming with the cable channel and the consumer product giant for a remake of Jackie Gleason's 1962 comedy Gigot. Macy and Schachter are writing the script for the new take on the heartwarming story of kindhearted janitor Gigot, who befriends the little daughter of a prostitute. Macy will take on the title role, played in the original by Gleason. Schachter, who helmed the Peabody Award-winning Door to Door, is set to direct. Gene Kelly directed the original Gigot, for which Gleason co-wrote the script and the music. Door to Door executive producer David A. Rosemont is set to executive produce the Gigot remake, with Macy and Schachter producing. Macy and Schachter's script for Door to Door has earned them a Writers Guild Award nomination. For his portrayal of cerebral palsy-ridden salesman Bill Porter in the movie, Macy received Golden Globe and SAG Award nominations. Macy and Schachter are repped by Writers & Artists Agency and manager Ken Gross.
William H. Macy and Steven Schachter, the duo behind TNT/Johnson & Johnson's critical and commercial success Door to Door, are reteaming with the cable channel and the consumer product giant for a remake of Jackie Gleason's 1962 comedy Gigot. Macy and Schachter are writing the script for the new take on the heartwarming story of kindhearted janitor Gigot, who befriends the little daughter of a prostitute. Macy will take on the title role, played in the original by Gleason. Schachter, who helmed the Peabody Award-winning Door to Door, is set to direct. Gene Kelly directed the original Gigot, for which Gleason co-wrote the script and the music. Door to Door executive producer David A. Rosemont is set to executive produce the Gigot remake, with Macy and Schachter producing. Macy and Schachter's script for Door to Door has earned them a Writers Guild Award nomination. For his portrayal of cerebral palsy-ridden salesman Bill Porter in the movie, Macy received Golden Globe and SAG Award nominations. Macy and Schachter are repped by Writers & Artists Agency and manager Ken Gross.
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