Movies
Paramount Experimenting with Low Budget Filmmaking
Hats off to Paramount PIctures for doing something not only original, but f*cking commendable. With all that money to throw around, why not try and discover some hidden talent by making a string of low budget pictures? Seeking to replicate the stunning success of Paranormal Activity, Paramount’s launching an initiative that will spend $1 million annually to develop and produce microbudget films. The move is designed to place between 10 and 20 projects in development by the end of next year, with no individual budget topping $100,000. Pretty cool, no? Read more about this inside and start working on your pitches mofos!
Paramount Film Group prexy Adam Goodman, promoted to the slot in June, cooked up the plan in the successful wake of “Paranormal,” made for $15,000 and grossing more than $100 million domestically.
Goodman indicated the funds, which will come out of the studio’s overall production budget, will be targeted at both unknowns and established filmmakers, with the goal of increasing the studio’s ability to find new voices and ideas. In addition, the initiative’s aimed at giving Paramount a more diverse portfolio of titles at a time when Hollywood’s devoting most of its resources to megabudget pics, such as Par’s “Transformers” and “Star Trek” franchises.
The studio hasn’t set a target of how many projects would receive a theatrical release. The microbudget projects could also conceivably be remade with conventional budgets.
Paramount originally planned to release “Shutter Island” in early October but, citing costs, decided in late August to push that title back to February and opted for “Paranormal Activity” instead.
Par was able to make effective use of a low-cost grassroots release strategy, starting with a dozen midnight screenings of Oren Peli’s horror-thriller in college towns before launching a gradual rollout that built on strong word of mouth.
It was announced two weeks ago that Paramount is resurrecting the Scary Movie spoof franchise with a brand new reboot movie, which will likely arrive in theaters next year.
The new movie, a joint venture between Paramount and Miramax that will technically be the sixth installment in the franchise, is expected to go into production this coming Fall.
We don’t yet know who will be writing, directing or starring in the Scary Movie reboot, but two actors in particular have already expressed an interest in joining the franchise.
The first is Melissa Barrera, who can currently be seen in theaters in Radio Silence’s bloody horror movie Abigail. Barrera is of course also the star of Scream and Scream VI, which kind of makes her a perfect candidate to lampoon herself in a Scary Movie reboot.
“I always loved those movies,” Melissa Barrera tells the website Inverse. “When I saw it announced, I was like, ‘Oh, that would be fun.’ That would be so fun to do.”
The actress adds, “They have the iconic cast that did it, so we’ll see what goes on with that. I’m just excited to see a new one.”
In a tweet posted last night, Bailee Madison (The Strangers: Prey at Night, the upcoming “Pretty Little Liars: Summer School”) also threw her hat in the running.
Madison tweets, “Random but scary movie 6 hit me up cause I just feel like we’d have fun okay bye.” Your move, Paramount. And make sure you call Anna Faris and Regina Hall too.
Directed by Keenen Ivory Wayans, the first Scary Movie was released in 2000, just four years after Wes Craven reinvigorated the horror genre with his meta slasher masterpiece, Scream.
The film parodied horror movies of the time including Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer, and The Blair Witch Project, and the horror-comedy spoof scared up $278 million at the worldwide box office. The success of that first Scary Movie paved the way for an entire franchise of horror spoofs, five of them in total released between 2000 and 2013.
Bailee Madison in “The Strangers: Prey at Night’
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