The Playlist

Focus Features Ready To Sign Up For Matthew McConaughey's 'The Dallas Buyer's Club' For Fall Release

By Charlie Schmidlin
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April 8, 2013 9:24 AM
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2 Comments

News

For audiences and especially filmmakers, there is an aspect of deflated confusion in an actor’s misled sacrifices for an underwhelming film -- just ask Jared Leto in his role of Mark David Chapman in “Chapter 27.” Luckily, with the 2012 that Matthew McConaughey had, which saw “Bernie,” “Magic Mike,” and “Killer Joe,” that sort of fate for his AIDS drama “The Dallas Buyers Club” is unlikely, and now seems even more unlikely with the arrival of some welcome distribution news.

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Laika & Focus Features Announce New Animated Feature 'The Boxtrolls' For 2014 Release

By Drew Taylor
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February 8, 2013 12:22 PM
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2 Comments

News

This has been a crazy week for animation news – Henry Selick's seemingly doomed “The Shadow King” got resurrected; DreamWorks Animation’s financial troubles became very public (leading to schedule shifts and the cancellation of one film); and now here’s another bit of animation world news to get the blood going: Seattle-based stop motion studio Laika and Focus Features will reteam once again for “The Boxtrolls,” which has officially started production, for release on October 17th, 2014. This is the painstaking world of stop motion animation – get cracking boys!

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Focus Features Will 'Kill The Messenger' With Jeremy Renner

By Kevin Jagernauth
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February 5, 2013 1:47 PM
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2 Comments

News

Well, that didn't take long. Just a few short days after Jeremy Renner signed up for the very promising "Kill the Messenger," the project has now landed a great home.

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Janis Joplin Biopic Starring Amy Adams Back On, Lee Daniels To Direct

By Kevin Jagernauth
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October 16, 2012 11:26 PM
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14 Comments

News

The year was 2010, and at the time Amy Adams was attached to play famed rocker Janis Joplin with "City Of God" helmer Fernando Meirelles to helm. Or that was at least the plan. And then there was nothing heard again about a biopic until earlier this year when "Martha Marcy May Marlene" helmer Sean Durkin signed up for "Joplin" with Nina Arianda in the lead role. And now, there is some fierce competition from Adams, as her movie is back moving, not only eyeing a similar start date but bringing a name director along with it.

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Derek Cianfrance Says 'Place Beyond The Pines' Will Arrive In Theaters Sometime In 2013

By Edward Davis
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September 10, 2012 2:15 PM
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6 Comments

News

Derek Cianfrance's "The Place Beyond the Pines" was one of the most anticipated films of the Toronto International Film Festival and, meeting lofty expectations, the film made a big splash this weekend in Canada's largest city. Starring Ryan Gosling, Bradley Cooper, Eva Mendes, Ray Liotta, Rose Byrne, Dane DeHaan, Ben Mendelsohn and standout newcomer Emory Cohen, reviews of 'Pines' were largely glowing (you can read our A-grade review here), a bidding war for the North Amercan rights started almost immediately and the the film finally landed in the arms of Focus Features.

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Focus Features Go To 'The Place Beyond The Pines,' 'Great Expectations' And 'Jayne Mansfield's Car' Also Find Homes

By Oliver Lyttelton
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September 9, 2012 2:32 PM
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3 Comments

News

Several days into this year's Toronto International Film Festival, the buyers' market hasn't quite caught fire yet. A few films have been picked up, mostly on the smaller scale of things, but the first few days have mostly been made up of films that already have distribution – the "Cloud Atlas"es, "Silver Linings Playbook"s and "Anna Karenina"s of the world. But in the next few days, the real hot tickets start to unspool, and the first major acquisition of the festival has been made.

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'Compliance' Director Craig Zobel To Direct Untitled Thriller Pitch For Focus Features

By Drew Taylor
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August 29, 2012 3:36 PM
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0 Comments

News

Variety is reporting that Focus Features, the indie wing of monolithic Universal Pictures that has had a great year so far with sleeper hits in the stop-motion-animated marvel "ParaNorman" and the Wes Anderson romp "Moonrise Kingdom," has just acquired an untitled thriller pitch from "Compliance" director Craig Zobel. Zobel will write and direct the movie. Plot specifics are being kept under wraps, so we can go ahead and wildly speculate that it's about a vampire that falls in love with a robot but their love is put to the test when they uncover a conspiracy to assassinate the president of Uganda.

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'Pariah' Director Dee Rees To Helm Indie Love Story 'This Man, This Woman'

By Kevin Jagernauth
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May 1, 2012 5:57 PM
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0 Comments

News

Director Dee Rees hasn't been in any particular hurry to follow up the acclaimed and excellent "Pariah," but she's not without options. Earlier this year it was reported she was writing a new film entitled "Large Print," about a recently divorced, mid-50s insurance adjuster, she's got a thriller called "Bolo" she's developing with Focus Features and she's working on a project at HBO with Viola Davis. Well, now her slate is beginning to get a little more crowded.

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'An Education' Director Lone Scherfig To Helm 'My Life In Orange'

By Kevin Jagernauth
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April 26, 2012 2:42 PM
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0 Comments

News

With Lone Scherfig breaking out with "An Education" in 2009 and discovering a star in Carey Mulligan, it made it all the more disappointing when she returned two years later with the relatively limp rom-com "One Day." It took a bit off our shine for the helmer, but we're still interested to see what's she got cooking up next. Last year, she signed on to the historical drama "Music and Silence," but considering how hard it is to get anything that isn't a blockbuster or can't sell toys to kids, we're not surprised there hasn't been much movement on that. But this looks like someting that could develop a bit faster.

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Ciarán Hinds, Julia Stiles & Riz Ahmed Join Untitled Eric Bana, Rebecca Hall-Led Suspense Thriller

By Edward Davis
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April 11, 2012 7:00 PM
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1 Comment

News

Production begins next week in the U.K. on Focus Features and Working Title's latest collaboration: an untitled suspense thriller that stars Eric Bana, Rebecca Hall and Jim Broadbent. And there's plenty of reason to pay attention, apart from the boutique studios with discerning film taste and these three stars.

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