Movies
TIFF ’11: ‘Vamps’ Sinks Its Teeth Into Foreign Territories, Can The US Be Far Behind?
I’m rooting for Amy Heckerling. When she’s on, she’s really on (Fast Times At Ridgemont High, Clueless). But when she’s off, we get Loser. I’m hoping Vamps is a return to those glory days. Hopefully with the welcome addition of vampires that don’t sparkle or live in Louisiana.
The film just recently pinned down a lot of foreign territories. Per Variety, “Parlay Films announced Saturday at the Toronto Film Festival that it had closed deals on Germany with Wild Bunch and France with Metropolitan… Other foreign sales include eOne in Benelux, Tanweer in India/Pakistan, Swen in Brazil, Leopolis in CIS/Baltic States, SPI for Eastern Europe, Village Roadshow in Greece/Cyprus, Myndform in Iceland, PT Amero in Indonesia, CineSky for Intl Airlines, Shapira Films LTD. via Fintage in Israel, Eagle in the Middle East, Pioneer in the Philippines, PRIS Audiovisuais in Portugal, Scanbox in Scandinavia, Shaw in Singapore, Nu Metro in South Africa, Ascot in Switzerland, Serenity in Taiwan, and Pinema in Turkey.”
With all of those deals pegged can a US distributor/release date be far behind? Cassian Elwes and Kevin Iwashina are handling the domestic rights. Elwes has been around a long time and is no slouch, so I’d imagine we’ll be hearing some good news soon.
Movies
‘Desperation’ – Sam Raimi and ‘Final Destination Bloodlines’ Directors Teaming for Stephen King Movie
Stephen King’s 1996 novel Desperation is headed back to the screen, with Jeff Sneider breaking the news on The InSneider that Sam Raimi, Stephen King, and Final Destination Bloodlines directors Adam B. Stein and Zach Lipovsky are coming together for the film.
Sam Raimi will produce the upcoming Desperation movie, while Stein and Lipovsky are on board to direct. Searchlight Pictures is the studio attached to the feature film project.
Published in 1996, Stephen King’s novel Desperation was previously turned into a made-for-TV movie starring Ron Perlman, Tom Skerritt and Steven Weber back in 2006.
Wikipedia reminds, “Desperation is a story about several people who, while traveling along the desolated Highway 50 in Nevada, get abducted by Collie Entragian, the deputy of the fictional mining town of Desperation. Entragian uses various pretexts for the abductions, from an arrest for drug possession to ‘rescuing’ a family from a nonexistent gunman. It becomes clear to the captives that Entragian has been possessed by an evil being named Tak, who has control over the surrounding desert wildlife and must change hosts to keep itself alive.
“They begin to fight for their freedom, sanity and lives before realizing that if they are ever to escape Desperation, they must trap Tak in the place from which he came.”
Desperation was published at the same time as Stephen King’s own “mirror novel” titled The Regulators, which shares characters but takes place in an alternate universe.
The union of Sam Raimi and Stephen King is an exciting one for fans of both Raimi and King, and there’s a nice bit of full circle history there too. As you may recall, it was Stephen King’s review of The Evil Dead that Raimi credits for saving and legitimizing his indie debut feature.
And the rest is history! Stay tuned for more on this developing story.
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