Universal has found its director for international thriller "The Sigma Protocol": Berlin prize winner Jose Padilha.
The studio is in negotiations with the helmer of "Elite Squad," the action movie that won the Golden Bear at last year's Berlin International Film Festival, to direct the Robert Ludlum vehicle.
The studio is planning a summer shoot with European locations. Jeffrey Weiner of Ludlum Entertainment as well as Strike Entertainment are producing; Scott Bernstein and Franklin Leonard are overseeing for Universal.
"Sigma" is based on Ludlum's final completed novel, published after the prolific author's death in 2001. Like the Jason Bourne franchise, another big Uni property, the story involves a man on the run in Europe from assassins and agents.
The two plots differ sharply, though, with the latter using a World War II conspiracy and Nazis as a plot hook. The movie will update the novel, use the current economic climate...
The studio is in negotiations with the helmer of "Elite Squad," the action movie that won the Golden Bear at last year's Berlin International Film Festival, to direct the Robert Ludlum vehicle.
The studio is planning a summer shoot with European locations. Jeffrey Weiner of Ludlum Entertainment as well as Strike Entertainment are producing; Scott Bernstein and Franklin Leonard are overseeing for Universal.
"Sigma" is based on Ludlum's final completed novel, published after the prolific author's death in 2001. Like the Jason Bourne franchise, another big Uni property, the story involves a man on the run in Europe from assassins and agents.
The two plots differ sharply, though, with the latter using a World War II conspiracy and Nazis as a plot hook. The movie will update the novel, use the current economic climate...
- 1/27/2009
- by By Steven Zeitchik and Borys Kit
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
- Like what had occurred over at the Golden Globes, it comes as no surprise that the Brits backed homegrown Joe Wright period piece of Atonement. Picking up a grand total of 14 nominees, the BAFTAs also gave There Will Be Blood, No Country for Old Men and Michael Clayton to celebrate. See the complete list below to see how they do things on the other side of the Atlantic. The full list of nominations follows:film“American Gangster” — Brian Grazer/Ridley Scott“Atonement” — Tim Bevan/Eric Fellner/Paul Webster“The Lives of Others” — Quirin Berg/Max Wiedemann“No Country for Old Men” — Scott Rudin/Joel Coen/Ethan Coen“There Will Be Blood” — JoAnne Sellar/Paul Thomas Anderson/Daniel LupiBRITISH Film“Atonement” — Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner, Paul Webster, Joe Wright, Christopher Hampton“The Bourne Ultimatum” — Frank Marshall, Patrick Crowley, Paul L. Sandberg, Paul Greengrass, Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns, George Nolfi“Control” — Orian Williams,
- 1/17/2008
- IONCINEMA.com
Jason Bourne returns to America in his quest to discover his true identity, and North American moviegoers embraced his homecoming as "The Bourne Ultimatum" rushed to an estimated $70.2 million opening weekend.
Although Universal Pictures' propulsive chase movie dominated the frame, Buena Vista Pictures' "Underdog" found some favor with family audiences. But the weekend's other new wide arrivals, Paramount Pictures' comedy "Hot Rod" and Lionsgate's teen outing "Bratz: The Movie", received the cold shoulder.
The PG-13 "Ultimatum" -- with Paul Greengrass, who directed "The Bourne Supremacy" three years ago, again at the helm -- raced past the bows of 2002's "The Bourne Identity", which opened to $27.2 million, and 2004's "Supremacy", which arrived to $52.5 million.
Applauded by critics -- it earned a 94% approval rating at RottenTomatoes.com -- the film written by Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns and George Nolfi and produced by Frank Marshall, Patrick Crowley and Paul Sandberg earned an A from moviegoers according to CinemaScore as it racked up a per-theater average of $19,175.
The latest film in the spy series based on the Robert Ludlum novels established a new record for the best August opening, surpassing the $67.4 million bow of "Rush Hour 2" in 2001. Its Friday gross of $24.65 million was a new in-house record for Universal, whose previous best Friday had been posted by 2003's "Hulk". It also topped all the openings of the James Bond movies and established personal bests for Greengrass and star Matt Damon.
"Moviegoers seemed to sense that something great was going to happen -- reviewers and audiences alike rated this one the best one yet," Universal distribution president Nikki Rocco said. "Matt Damon, Paul Greengrass and Frank Marshall all delivered, and all the stars just aligned right."
Led by "Bourne", the weekend's top 10 films collected $158.8 million, up 37% from the comparable frame a year ago, according to Nielsen EDI. Last year at this time, Sony Pictures' "Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby" bowed to $47 million, followed by Paramount's animated "Barnyard" in the second spot with $15.8 million.
Although Universal Pictures' propulsive chase movie dominated the frame, Buena Vista Pictures' "Underdog" found some favor with family audiences. But the weekend's other new wide arrivals, Paramount Pictures' comedy "Hot Rod" and Lionsgate's teen outing "Bratz: The Movie", received the cold shoulder.
The PG-13 "Ultimatum" -- with Paul Greengrass, who directed "The Bourne Supremacy" three years ago, again at the helm -- raced past the bows of 2002's "The Bourne Identity", which opened to $27.2 million, and 2004's "Supremacy", which arrived to $52.5 million.
Applauded by critics -- it earned a 94% approval rating at RottenTomatoes.com -- the film written by Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns and George Nolfi and produced by Frank Marshall, Patrick Crowley and Paul Sandberg earned an A from moviegoers according to CinemaScore as it racked up a per-theater average of $19,175.
The latest film in the spy series based on the Robert Ludlum novels established a new record for the best August opening, surpassing the $67.4 million bow of "Rush Hour 2" in 2001. Its Friday gross of $24.65 million was a new in-house record for Universal, whose previous best Friday had been posted by 2003's "Hulk". It also topped all the openings of the James Bond movies and established personal bests for Greengrass and star Matt Damon.
"Moviegoers seemed to sense that something great was going to happen -- reviewers and audiences alike rated this one the best one yet," Universal distribution president Nikki Rocco said. "Matt Damon, Paul Greengrass and Frank Marshall all delivered, and all the stars just aligned right."
Led by "Bourne", the weekend's top 10 films collected $158.8 million, up 37% from the comparable frame a year ago, according to Nielsen EDI. Last year at this time, Sony Pictures' "Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby" bowed to $47 million, followed by Paramount's animated "Barnyard" in the second spot with $15.8 million.
This review was written for the theatrical release of "The Bourne Ultimatum"."The Bourne Ultimatum", the culminating film of the trilogy begun five years ago with "The Bourne Identity", gets under way with a burst of nervous energy and extreme urgency and never lets up. It's a 114-minute chase film, dashing through streets and rooftops of any number of international urban sprawls with Matt Damon's redoubtable Jason Bourne hot on the trail of -- himself. That might be the genius of the series: A James Bond-like character who can escape any pickle and thwart any villain, but all in a quest for his own identity. Jason is not out to save the world -- though he might do that -- he'd just like to know his real name.
Director Paul Greengrass, who only made the astonishing "United 93" in the interim, returns for his second "Bourne" film (after 2004's "The Bourne Supremacy") to bring the roller coaster ride to an end in a dead heat where all the plot points and (surviving) characters of the three films converge. Audiences will eat it up: This is a postmillennial spy-action movie pitched to a large international audience. You hardly need subtitles.
Article Templatehttp://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1119669402http://www.brightcove.com/channel.jsp?channel=769341148 var config = new Array();config["videoId"] = 1135484455;config["lineupId"] = null;config["videoRef"] = null;config["playerTag"] = null;config["autoStart"] = false;config["preloadBackColor"] = "#FFFFFF";config["width"] = 286; config["height"] = 277; config["playerId"] = 1119669402; createExperience(config, 8); The cool thing about this movie is that the real revenge is not against bad guys in the CIA, but against the high-tech world that maddens mere mortals. Your mobile phone drops calls? Your car needs towing after a parking-lot fender-bender? Well, Jason can switch phones and patch into the world from trains, subways, stairwells and undergrounds. Any car he steals leaps up sharp inclines, plunges off of roofs or smashes into other vehicles until reduced to smoldering metal yet can still outrace any car on the block.
And his body! Blow it up with a bomb, expose it to brutal hand-to-hand combat or throw it into the East River, and it gets up with a few manly scratches.Yes, there are a few plot holes. But few are likely to care. A smart cast of veteran actors gives the film just enough emotional heft to carry you through the silliness. Damon has definitely made Bourne his own. For all his physical dexterity and killing instincts, Damon brings a Hamlet-like quality to the CIA-trained assassin suffering from a five-year spell of amnesia who can never quite tell who his friends are, or rather, which of his enemies might be a true friend.
Joan Allen returns as the CIA investigator who has slowly come to see that Jason might be the real deal. And Julia Stiles as an in-over-her-head agent again shows up for no credible reason other than the producers want her back. (They're right.)
Newcomers include a flinty and increasingly antsy David Strathairn as a head of a black-ops program that has its real-life model in all the extralegal programs sponsored by the current administration. At one point, he declares "you can't make this stuff up," and you know the filmmakers are nodding toward today's Washington.
Scott Glenn appears as a law-ignoring CIA director, though he might remind you more of the current attorney general, and Albert Finney crops up toward at the end as a Dr. Mengele figure behind a behavior-mod program that created any number of Jason Bournes.
The movie swings through Moscow (filched from the previous film); Paris; Turin, Italy; London; Madrid; Tangiers, Morocco; and New York as Jason Hones in on who did this to him. (That's another thing -- he never has to endure airport security checks!)
A fatigue factor sets in somewhere; it might vary from person to person. Yet the sharp intelligence behind the screenplay by Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns and George Nolfi (though other hands reportedly contributed) gives the plot, salvaged from the Robert Ludlum Cold War spy novel, a genuine buoyancy. The film is trying to get at something, no matter how crudely, about corruption within the American espionage system, with its secret reliance on renditions and torture in the name of freedom. This might not be the best way to illustrate the problem with credibility-stretchers at every turn. But then again, how many people look at documentaries?
Greengrass tops himself with each passing minute by staging terrific stunts and chases through crowded streets, buildings and rooftops. Cinematographer Oliver Wood and editor Christopher Rouse gives the film its lightning speed and jagged edges with a close, hand-held camera and quick edits while John Powell's score pulsates pure adrenaline.
THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM
Universal Pictures
Universal Pictures in association with MP Beta Prods. presents a Kennedy/Marshall production in association with Ludlum Entertainment
Credits:
Director: Paul Greengrass
Screenwriters: Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns, George Nolfi
Screen story: Tony Gilroy
Based on the novel by: Robert Ludlum
Producers: Frank Marshall, Patrick Crowley, Paul L. Sandberg
Executive producers: Jeffrey M. Weiner, Henry Morrison, Doug Liman
Director of photography: Oliver Wood
Production designer: Peter Wenham
Costume designer: Shay Cunliffe
Music: John Powell
Editor: Christopher Rouse
Cast:
Jason Bourne: Matt Damon
Nicky Parsons: Julia Stiles
Noah Vosen: David Strathairn
Ezra Kramer: Scott Glenn
Sam Ross: Paddy Considine
Paz: Edgar Romeriz
Pamela: Joan Allen
Dr. Hirsch: Albert Finney
Running time -- 114 minutes
MPAA rating: PG-13...
Director Paul Greengrass, who only made the astonishing "United 93" in the interim, returns for his second "Bourne" film (after 2004's "The Bourne Supremacy") to bring the roller coaster ride to an end in a dead heat where all the plot points and (surviving) characters of the three films converge. Audiences will eat it up: This is a postmillennial spy-action movie pitched to a large international audience. You hardly need subtitles.
Article Templatehttp://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1119669402http://www.brightcove.com/channel.jsp?channel=769341148 var config = new Array();config["videoId"] = 1135484455;config["lineupId"] = null;config["videoRef"] = null;config["playerTag"] = null;config["autoStart"] = false;config["preloadBackColor"] = "#FFFFFF";config["width"] = 286; config["height"] = 277; config["playerId"] = 1119669402; createExperience(config, 8); The cool thing about this movie is that the real revenge is not against bad guys in the CIA, but against the high-tech world that maddens mere mortals. Your mobile phone drops calls? Your car needs towing after a parking-lot fender-bender? Well, Jason can switch phones and patch into the world from trains, subways, stairwells and undergrounds. Any car he steals leaps up sharp inclines, plunges off of roofs or smashes into other vehicles until reduced to smoldering metal yet can still outrace any car on the block.
And his body! Blow it up with a bomb, expose it to brutal hand-to-hand combat or throw it into the East River, and it gets up with a few manly scratches.Yes, there are a few plot holes. But few are likely to care. A smart cast of veteran actors gives the film just enough emotional heft to carry you through the silliness. Damon has definitely made Bourne his own. For all his physical dexterity and killing instincts, Damon brings a Hamlet-like quality to the CIA-trained assassin suffering from a five-year spell of amnesia who can never quite tell who his friends are, or rather, which of his enemies might be a true friend.
Joan Allen returns as the CIA investigator who has slowly come to see that Jason might be the real deal. And Julia Stiles as an in-over-her-head agent again shows up for no credible reason other than the producers want her back. (They're right.)
Newcomers include a flinty and increasingly antsy David Strathairn as a head of a black-ops program that has its real-life model in all the extralegal programs sponsored by the current administration. At one point, he declares "you can't make this stuff up," and you know the filmmakers are nodding toward today's Washington.
Scott Glenn appears as a law-ignoring CIA director, though he might remind you more of the current attorney general, and Albert Finney crops up toward at the end as a Dr. Mengele figure behind a behavior-mod program that created any number of Jason Bournes.
The movie swings through Moscow (filched from the previous film); Paris; Turin, Italy; London; Madrid; Tangiers, Morocco; and New York as Jason Hones in on who did this to him. (That's another thing -- he never has to endure airport security checks!)
A fatigue factor sets in somewhere; it might vary from person to person. Yet the sharp intelligence behind the screenplay by Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns and George Nolfi (though other hands reportedly contributed) gives the plot, salvaged from the Robert Ludlum Cold War spy novel, a genuine buoyancy. The film is trying to get at something, no matter how crudely, about corruption within the American espionage system, with its secret reliance on renditions and torture in the name of freedom. This might not be the best way to illustrate the problem with credibility-stretchers at every turn. But then again, how many people look at documentaries?
Greengrass tops himself with each passing minute by staging terrific stunts and chases through crowded streets, buildings and rooftops. Cinematographer Oliver Wood and editor Christopher Rouse gives the film its lightning speed and jagged edges with a close, hand-held camera and quick edits while John Powell's score pulsates pure adrenaline.
THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM
Universal Pictures
Universal Pictures in association with MP Beta Prods. presents a Kennedy/Marshall production in association with Ludlum Entertainment
Credits:
Director: Paul Greengrass
Screenwriters: Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns, George Nolfi
Screen story: Tony Gilroy
Based on the novel by: Robert Ludlum
Producers: Frank Marshall, Patrick Crowley, Paul L. Sandberg
Executive producers: Jeffrey M. Weiner, Henry Morrison, Doug Liman
Director of photography: Oliver Wood
Production designer: Peter Wenham
Costume designer: Shay Cunliffe
Music: John Powell
Editor: Christopher Rouse
Cast:
Jason Bourne: Matt Damon
Nicky Parsons: Julia Stiles
Noah Vosen: David Strathairn
Ezra Kramer: Scott Glenn
Sam Ross: Paddy Considine
Paz: Edgar Romeriz
Pamela: Joan Allen
Dr. Hirsch: Albert Finney
Running time -- 114 minutes
MPAA rating: PG-13...
The Bourne Ultimatum, the culminating film of the trilogy begun five years ago with The Bourne Identity, gets under way with a burst of nervous energy and extreme urgency and never lets up. It's a 114-minute chase film, dashing through streets and rooftops of any number of international urban sprawls with Matt Damon's redoubtable Jason Bourne hot on the trail of -- himself. That might be the genius of the series: A James Bond-like character who can escape any pickle and thwart any villain, but all in a quest for his own identity. Jason is not out to save the world -- though he might do that -- he'd just like to know his real name.
Director Paul Greengrass, who only made the astonishing United 93 in the interim, returns for his second Bourne film (after 2004's The Bourne Supremacy) to bring the roller coaster ride to an end in a dead heat where all the plot points and (surviving) characters of the three films converge. Audiences will eat it up: This is a postmillennial spy-action movie pitched to a large international audience. You hardly need subtitles.
The cool thing about this movie is that the real revenge is not against bad guys in the CIA, but against the high-tech world that maddens mere mortals. Your mobile phone drops calls? Your car needs towing after a parking-lot fender-bender? Well, Jason can switch phones and patch into the world from trains, subways, stairwells and undergrounds. Any car he steals leaps up sharp inclines, plunges off of roofs or smashes into other vehicles until reduced to smoldering metal yet can still outrace any car on the block.
And his body! Blow it up with a bomb, expose it to brutal hand-to-hand combat or throw it into the East River, and it gets up with a few manly scratches.
Yes, there are a few plot holes. But few are likely to care. A smart cast of veteran actors gives the film just enough emotional heft to carry you through the silliness. Damon has definitely made Bourne his own. For all his physical dexterity and killing instincts, Damon brings a Hamlet-like quality to the CIA-trained assassin suffering from a five-year spell of amnesia who can never quite tell who his friends are, or rather, which of his enemies might be a true friend.
Joan Allen returns as the CIA investigator who has slowly come to see that Jason might be the real deal. And Julia Stiles as an in-over-her-head agent again shows up for no credible reason other than the producers want her back. (They're right.)
Newcomers include a flinty and increasingly antsy David Strathairn as a head of a black-ops program that has its real-life model in all the extralegal programs sponsored by the current administration. At one point, he declares "you can't make this stuff up," and you know the filmmakers are nodding toward today's Washington.
Scott Glenn appears as a law-ignoring CIA director, though he might remind you more of the current attorney general, and Albert Finney crops up toward at the end as a Dr. Mengele figure behind a behavior-mod program that created any number of Jason Bournes.
The movie swings through Moscow (filched from the previous film); Paris; Turin, Italy; London; Madrid; Tangiers, Morocco; and New York as Jason Hones in on who did this to him. (That's another thing -- he never has to endure airport security checks!)
A fatigue factor sets in somewhere; it might vary from person to person. Yet the sharp intelligence behind the screenplay by Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns and George Nolfi (though other hands reportedly contributed) gives the plot, salvaged from the Robert Ludlum Cold War spy novel, a genuine buoyancy. The film is trying to get at something, no matter how crudely, about corruption within the American espionage system, with its secret reliance on renditions and torture in the name of freedom. This might not be the best way to illustrate the problem with credibility-stretchers at every turn. But then again, how many people look at documentaries?
Greengrass tops himself with each passing minute by staging terrific stunts and chases through crowded streets, buildings and rooftops. Cinematographer Oliver Wood and editor Christopher Rouse gives the film its lightning speed and jagged edges with a close, hand-held camera and quick edits while John Powell's score pulsates pure adrenaline.
THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM
Universal Pictures
Universal Pictures in association with MP Beta Prods. presents a Kennedy/Marshall production in association with Ludlum Entertainment
Credits:
Director: Paul Greengrass
Screenwriters: Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns, George Nolfi
Screen story: Tony Gilroy
Based on the novel by: Robert Ludlum
Producers: Frank Marshall, Patrick Crowley, Paul L. Sandberg
Executive producers: Jeffrey M. Weiner, Henry Morrison, Doug Liman
Director of photography: Oliver Wood
Production designer: Peter Wenham
Costume designer: Shay Cunliffe
Music: John Powell
Editor: Christopher Rouse
Cast:
Jason Bourne: Matt Damon
Nicky Parsons: Julia Stiles
Noah Vosen: David Strathairn
Ezra Kramer: Scott Glenn
Sam Ross: Paddy Considine
Paz: Edgar Romeriz
Pamela: Joan Allen
Dr. Hirsch: Albert Finney
Running time -- 114 minutes
MPAA rating: PG-13...
Director Paul Greengrass, who only made the astonishing United 93 in the interim, returns for his second Bourne film (after 2004's The Bourne Supremacy) to bring the roller coaster ride to an end in a dead heat where all the plot points and (surviving) characters of the three films converge. Audiences will eat it up: This is a postmillennial spy-action movie pitched to a large international audience. You hardly need subtitles.
The cool thing about this movie is that the real revenge is not against bad guys in the CIA, but against the high-tech world that maddens mere mortals. Your mobile phone drops calls? Your car needs towing after a parking-lot fender-bender? Well, Jason can switch phones and patch into the world from trains, subways, stairwells and undergrounds. Any car he steals leaps up sharp inclines, plunges off of roofs or smashes into other vehicles until reduced to smoldering metal yet can still outrace any car on the block.
And his body! Blow it up with a bomb, expose it to brutal hand-to-hand combat or throw it into the East River, and it gets up with a few manly scratches.
Yes, there are a few plot holes. But few are likely to care. A smart cast of veteran actors gives the film just enough emotional heft to carry you through the silliness. Damon has definitely made Bourne his own. For all his physical dexterity and killing instincts, Damon brings a Hamlet-like quality to the CIA-trained assassin suffering from a five-year spell of amnesia who can never quite tell who his friends are, or rather, which of his enemies might be a true friend.
Joan Allen returns as the CIA investigator who has slowly come to see that Jason might be the real deal. And Julia Stiles as an in-over-her-head agent again shows up for no credible reason other than the producers want her back. (They're right.)
Newcomers include a flinty and increasingly antsy David Strathairn as a head of a black-ops program that has its real-life model in all the extralegal programs sponsored by the current administration. At one point, he declares "you can't make this stuff up," and you know the filmmakers are nodding toward today's Washington.
Scott Glenn appears as a law-ignoring CIA director, though he might remind you more of the current attorney general, and Albert Finney crops up toward at the end as a Dr. Mengele figure behind a behavior-mod program that created any number of Jason Bournes.
The movie swings through Moscow (filched from the previous film); Paris; Turin, Italy; London; Madrid; Tangiers, Morocco; and New York as Jason Hones in on who did this to him. (That's another thing -- he never has to endure airport security checks!)
A fatigue factor sets in somewhere; it might vary from person to person. Yet the sharp intelligence behind the screenplay by Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns and George Nolfi (though other hands reportedly contributed) gives the plot, salvaged from the Robert Ludlum Cold War spy novel, a genuine buoyancy. The film is trying to get at something, no matter how crudely, about corruption within the American espionage system, with its secret reliance on renditions and torture in the name of freedom. This might not be the best way to illustrate the problem with credibility-stretchers at every turn. But then again, how many people look at documentaries?
Greengrass tops himself with each passing minute by staging terrific stunts and chases through crowded streets, buildings and rooftops. Cinematographer Oliver Wood and editor Christopher Rouse gives the film its lightning speed and jagged edges with a close, hand-held camera and quick edits while John Powell's score pulsates pure adrenaline.
THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM
Universal Pictures
Universal Pictures in association with MP Beta Prods. presents a Kennedy/Marshall production in association with Ludlum Entertainment
Credits:
Director: Paul Greengrass
Screenwriters: Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns, George Nolfi
Screen story: Tony Gilroy
Based on the novel by: Robert Ludlum
Producers: Frank Marshall, Patrick Crowley, Paul L. Sandberg
Executive producers: Jeffrey M. Weiner, Henry Morrison, Doug Liman
Director of photography: Oliver Wood
Production designer: Peter Wenham
Costume designer: Shay Cunliffe
Music: John Powell
Editor: Christopher Rouse
Cast:
Jason Bourne: Matt Damon
Nicky Parsons: Julia Stiles
Noah Vosen: David Strathairn
Ezra Kramer: Scott Glenn
Sam Ross: Paddy Considine
Paz: Edgar Romeriz
Pamela: Joan Allen
Dr. Hirsch: Albert Finney
Running time -- 114 minutes
MPAA rating: PG-13...
- 7/25/2007
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Daughter of John, sister of Danny, the talented and tall Angelica Huston is climbing back into the director's chair for a 3rd time. After Bastard Out of Carolina and Agnes Browne, this new project will be distrbitued under the Focus Features banner. Huston will next be seen in Seraphim Falls Give Us a Kiss is a comic-drama set in the Ozarks (covers much of the southern half of Missouri and an extensive area of northwest Arkansas. The region extends to the west into extreme southeast Kansas and northeastern Oklahoma) and is based on the novel by Daniel Woodrell, a comic novelist who has penned books about hijinx in poorer regions of the Midwestern mountain range. Woodrell's novel concerns a crime novelist, his underachieving brother and a pot deal gone awry. Penning the script is Angus MacLachlan,...
- 11/17/2006
- IONCINEMA.com
Anjelica Huston is headed back to the director's chair for Give Us a Kiss, an adaptation of a Daniel Woodrell novel for Focus Features. Junebug writer Angus MacLachlan is writing the script, which will be produced by Paul L. Sandberg via his company, Ostensible Prods.
The story follows a struggling crime writer named Doyle who travels to his Ozarks hometown to track down his older brother Smoke, who is on the run from the law. There, he falls for Smoke's beautiful stepdaughter before helping Smoke in a criminal enterprise to pay off the law, while keeping a rival neighboring family at arm's length.
Woodrell is known for his "country noir" novels, with Kiss having been described as a white trash Pulp Fiction. One of his novels, Woe to Live On, was the basis for Ang Lee's Ride With the Devil.
Huston and Sandberg first worked together on this year's four-hour CBS miniseries Covert One: The Hades Factor. Huston played the U.S. president in the miniseries, which Sandberg executive produced.
The story follows a struggling crime writer named Doyle who travels to his Ozarks hometown to track down his older brother Smoke, who is on the run from the law. There, he falls for Smoke's beautiful stepdaughter before helping Smoke in a criminal enterprise to pay off the law, while keeping a rival neighboring family at arm's length.
Woodrell is known for his "country noir" novels, with Kiss having been described as a white trash Pulp Fiction. One of his novels, Woe to Live On, was the basis for Ang Lee's Ride With the Devil.
Huston and Sandberg first worked together on this year's four-hour CBS miniseries Covert One: The Hades Factor. Huston played the U.S. president in the miniseries, which Sandberg executive produced.
- 11/17/2006
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Paddy Considine has joined the cast of The Bourne Ultimatum, the third installment of Universal Pictures' successful action series starring Matt Damon. Paul Greengrass is directing. The story centers on assassin Jason Bourne (Damon) uncovering mysteries of his past, which puts him in the crosshairs of killers. Considine will play a London journalist who is tracking a former CIA director. Tony Gilroy, Tom Stoppard, Scott Burns and Paul Attanasio worked on the script. Frank Marshall, Paul Sandberg and Patrick Crowley are producing.
- 10/12/2006
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Universal Pictures has hired Jonathan Jakubowicz to write and direct the big-screen adaptation of Robert Ludlum's The Sigma Protocol. Paul L. Sandberg is producing. Protocol centers on an American economist who becomes the target of professional assassins. When a U.S. intelligence agent investigating his case finds herself discredited, the two end up on the run and uncover a vast multinational conspiracy manipulating the global economy and world events. The book was one of the last books written by Ludlum. Henry Morrison and Jeffrey Weiner will executive produce.
- 2/15/2006
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Producer Paul Sandberg has optioned first-time novelist Jeff Edwards' award-winning actioner Torpedo. The book is a modern-day technological sea-chase thriller revolving around a handful of U.S. Navy destroyers that must track down a wolfpack of state-of-the-art submarines whose passengers might have been responsible for a biological attack in Washington. Last month, Torpedo won the Admiral Nimitz Award for Outstanding Naval Fiction from the Military Writers Society of America.
- 8/15/2005
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
In the capable hands of Doug Liman, 2002's The Bourne Identity was able to cast off the creaky shackles of the conventional espionage thriller thanks to a kinetic energy that agreeably propelled the genre into the next millennium.
For The Bourne Supremacy, based on the second novel in the Robert Ludlum series, the director of Swingers and "Go" has gone (he still remains as one of the executive producers) but not before handing the reins to British filmmaker Paul Greengrass.
He's certainly an intriguing choice. For his previous film, the blistering Bloody Sunday, Greengrass brought a vital, documentary feel to his retelling of the 1972 civil rights march in Northern Ireland that ended tragically, with his handheld, darting cameras creating the desired effect of plunging the viewer right into the middle of the chaos.
The director incorporates essentially the same technique to track the further exploits of the amnesia-plagued Jason Bourne, but in this case the jittery fly-on-the-wall approach has the undesired opposite effect of driving a distracting wedge between the viewer and the chief protagonist.
While the picture still has its smartly choreographed moments, that audience disconnect will most likely prevent the Universal release from approaching the $120 million-plus heights of its predecessor.
When we catch up with Matt Damon's Bourne, he and his girlfriend Marie (Franka Potente) are finding it difficult to outrun his murky, haunting past, which has a way of resurfacing with every suspicious phone call and sidewise glance in every new city they attempt to call home.
But that paranoia proves justified after an attempt on his life by a paid assassin. Not to mention the fact that two recent deaths were made to look like Bourne's handiwork.
Determined to track down the responsible parties, Bourne initiates a complex game of cat and mouse with the equally determined Pamela Landy (Joan Allen), a CIA agent who likes to run things her way.
That dynamic begs for a gradually escalating tension that never materializes.
Instead Greengrass, working from a script by Tony Gilroy (who adapted the previous Bourne), relies on those highly caffeinated, handheld quick pans (by cinematographer Oliver Wood) and rapid cuts (courtesy of editors Christopher Rouse and Richard Pearson) to establish a feeling of urgency, but like its various post-Cold War European locations, the film remains chilly and distant.
Every time you feel like you're finally grabbing hold of something involving, the picture once again spins frustratingly out of reach.
His actors are certainly up to the task at hand, with Damon, Allen, Brian Cox (as Allen's antagonistic colleague) and Julia Stiles (as a field agent pressed into service as a go-between for Bourne and the CIA) turning in uniformly sturdy and intelligent performances.
The Bourne Supremacy
Universal Pictures
Univesal Pictures presents in association with MP Theta Prods.
a Kennedy/Marshall production in association with Ludlum Entertainment
Credits:
Director: Paul Greengrass
Screenwriter: Tony Gilroy
Based on the novel by: Robert Ludlum
Producers: Frank Marshall, Patrick Crowley, Paul L. Sandberg
Executive producers: Doug Liman, Jeffrey M. Weiner, Henry Morrison
Director of photography: Oliver Wood
Production designer: Dominic Watkins
Editors: Christopher Rouse, Richard Pearson
Costume designer: Dinah Collin
Music: John Powell
Cast:
Jason Bourne: Matt Damon
Marie: Franka Potente
Ward Abbott: Brian Cox
Nicky: Julia Stiles
Kirill: Karl Urban
Danny Zorn: Gabriel Mann
Agent Pamela Landy: Joan Allen
MPAA rating: PG-13
Rnning time -- 108 minutes...
For The Bourne Supremacy, based on the second novel in the Robert Ludlum series, the director of Swingers and "Go" has gone (he still remains as one of the executive producers) but not before handing the reins to British filmmaker Paul Greengrass.
He's certainly an intriguing choice. For his previous film, the blistering Bloody Sunday, Greengrass brought a vital, documentary feel to his retelling of the 1972 civil rights march in Northern Ireland that ended tragically, with his handheld, darting cameras creating the desired effect of plunging the viewer right into the middle of the chaos.
The director incorporates essentially the same technique to track the further exploits of the amnesia-plagued Jason Bourne, but in this case the jittery fly-on-the-wall approach has the undesired opposite effect of driving a distracting wedge between the viewer and the chief protagonist.
While the picture still has its smartly choreographed moments, that audience disconnect will most likely prevent the Universal release from approaching the $120 million-plus heights of its predecessor.
When we catch up with Matt Damon's Bourne, he and his girlfriend Marie (Franka Potente) are finding it difficult to outrun his murky, haunting past, which has a way of resurfacing with every suspicious phone call and sidewise glance in every new city they attempt to call home.
But that paranoia proves justified after an attempt on his life by a paid assassin. Not to mention the fact that two recent deaths were made to look like Bourne's handiwork.
Determined to track down the responsible parties, Bourne initiates a complex game of cat and mouse with the equally determined Pamela Landy (Joan Allen), a CIA agent who likes to run things her way.
That dynamic begs for a gradually escalating tension that never materializes.
Instead Greengrass, working from a script by Tony Gilroy (who adapted the previous Bourne), relies on those highly caffeinated, handheld quick pans (by cinematographer Oliver Wood) and rapid cuts (courtesy of editors Christopher Rouse and Richard Pearson) to establish a feeling of urgency, but like its various post-Cold War European locations, the film remains chilly and distant.
Every time you feel like you're finally grabbing hold of something involving, the picture once again spins frustratingly out of reach.
His actors are certainly up to the task at hand, with Damon, Allen, Brian Cox (as Allen's antagonistic colleague) and Julia Stiles (as a field agent pressed into service as a go-between for Bourne and the CIA) turning in uniformly sturdy and intelligent performances.
The Bourne Supremacy
Universal Pictures
Univesal Pictures presents in association with MP Theta Prods.
a Kennedy/Marshall production in association with Ludlum Entertainment
Credits:
Director: Paul Greengrass
Screenwriter: Tony Gilroy
Based on the novel by: Robert Ludlum
Producers: Frank Marshall, Patrick Crowley, Paul L. Sandberg
Executive producers: Doug Liman, Jeffrey M. Weiner, Henry Morrison
Director of photography: Oliver Wood
Production designer: Dominic Watkins
Editors: Christopher Rouse, Richard Pearson
Costume designer: Dinah Collin
Music: John Powell
Cast:
Jason Bourne: Matt Damon
Marie: Franka Potente
Ward Abbott: Brian Cox
Nicky: Julia Stiles
Kirill: Karl Urban
Danny Zorn: Gabriel Mann
Agent Pamela Landy: Joan Allen
MPAA rating: PG-13
Rnning time -- 108 minutes...
Producer Paul L. Sandberg has optioned first-time novelist Patrick Foss' The Bang Devils, published by Dark Alley/HarperCollins. The bloody Devils tells the tale of two young Americans -- nightclub bouncer Chris and hostess-turned-call girl Jessica -- living in Japan who find that being "exotic" Westerners gets them everything they desire. The two team up with Jessica's boyfriend to kidnap one of Jessica's clients and hold him for ransom. The plan falls apart when it turns out the client is a high-ranking yakuza whose fellow gangsters aren't in the mood to cooperate.
Brian Cox has signed on to reprise his role in The Bourne Supremacy, the sequel to Universal Pictures' The Bourne Identity. Cox will again team with Matt Damon and Franka Potente in the sequel along with Joan Allen and Karl Urban. Paul Greengrass is directing. Frank Marshall, Patrick Crowley and Paul L. Sandberg are producing from a script by Tony Gilroy inspired by Robert Ludlum's second novel in the Bourne series. At the same time, Cox has inked a deal to join Johnny Knoxville in the Farrelly brothers comedy The Ringer for Fox Searchlight Pictures. Barry Blaustein is directing from a script by Ricky Blitt. The comedy finds Knoxville's character posing as a mentally disabled man competing in the Special Olympics. Cox will play the uncle of Knoxville's character. The Farrelly brothers' Conundrum Entertainment is producing. Cox, who most recently starred onscreen in X2: X-Men United as William Stryker, recently wrapped a role as Agamemnon in Warner Bros. Pictures' Troy. He is repped by IFA Talent Agency and Lesher Entertainment.
- 11/6/2003
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.