Movies
Johnny Depp To Tell West Memphis Three Story
Johnny Depp and his producing partner Christi Dembrowski and their Infinitum Nihil production shingle have yet another interesting project in development. Deadline reports that they’ve optioned film rights to the soon-to-be-published and as-yet-untitled book by Damien Echols which reveals his experiences on death row after his wrongful conviction and subsequent wrongful 18-year imprisonment for the 1993 murder of three 8-year-old boys in West Memphis, Arkansas.
The memoir will be published in September 2012 by Blue Rider Press, an imprint of Penguin Books.
The injustice of the West Memphis Three story drew badly needed support from the entertainment community’s Peter Jackson, Eddie Vedder, Natalie Maines, Henry Rollins, and of course Depp. The actor and his producing partner have long been wanting and waiting to explore this story and will develop the narrative as a feature film with Echols and his wife Lorri Davis, who will be executive producers.
Their collective take is to spotlight the controversial conviction and imprisonment of the then 18-year-old who’s now in his mid-30s and to present his life before conviction as well its twists and turns leading to release. For those unfamiliar with the case, teenagers Echols, Jessie Misskelley Jr, and Jason Baldwin were arrested and convicted in 1994 for the murder of three young Cub Scouts who were the victims of a supposed satanic ritual. Despite faulty DNA evidence presented by prosecutors, Echols was condemned to death and Misskelley Jr and Baldwin sentenced to life in prison. The convictions drew national attention due to the brutality of the crimes, the lack of evidence, and the defendants’ insistence that they were innocent.
A documentary film produced in 1996, “Paradise Lost,” helped to shed light on the wrongful convictions, and an investigation provided critical information that finally helped the West Memphis Three achieve freedom in August 2011. That formed the basis of director Amy Berg’s upcoming 2012 feature documentary “West of Memphis” produced by filmmaker Jackson & Fran Walsh.
Filming is underway on The Invisible Man director Leigh Whannell’s Wolf Man for Universal and Blumhouse, which will be howling its way into theaters on January 17, 2025.
Deadline reports that Matilda Firth (Disenchanted) is the latest actor to sign on, joining Christopher Abbott (Poor Things), Julia Garner (The Royal Hotel), and Sam Jaeger.
The project will mark Whannell’s second monster movie and fourth directing collaboration with Blumhouse Productions (The Invisible Man, Upgrade, Insidious: Chapter 3).
Wolf Man stars Christopher Abbott as a man whose family is being terrorized by a lethal predator.
Writers include Whannell & Corbett Tuck as well as Lauren Schuker Blum & Rebecca Angelo.
Jason Blum is producing the film. Ryan Gosling, Ken Kao, Bea Sequeira, Mel Turner and Whannell are executive producers. Wolf Man is a Blumhouse and Motel Movies production.
In the wake of the failed Dark Universe, Leigh Whannell’s The Invisible Man has been the only real success story for the Universal Monsters brand, which has been struggling with recent box office flops including the comedic Renfield and period horror movie The Last Voyage of the Demeter. Giving him the keys to the castle once more seems like a wise idea, to say the least.
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