Projects matching: Atom Egoyan

Synopsis

Lanny Morris and Vince Collins are the country's hottest entertainment duo. They're knee deep in all the wealth and power that comes with such fame. That is, until a beautiful girl turns up naked and dead in the pair's hotel suite after a night of wild partying. Journalist Karen O'Connor's quest to uncover the facts leads her into an emotional and sexual relationship that proves impossible to break, even when the horrible truth of past actions is revealed.

Synopsis

Although Atom Egoyan's first adaptation The Sweet Hereafter won the Cannes jury prize and scored two Academy Award nominations, the writer-director was initially uncertain about tackling another novel as the basis of his next film. But when Icon head of development Karen Glasser sent him William Trevor's Felicia's Journey he was won over. "I was struck by the brilliance of the writing, the characters' depth and how many of the themes resonated with me," says Egoyan. The story follows naive Irish teenager Felicia as she treks to Birmingham to find her lover Johnny, but instead encounters the sinister and faintly comic Mr Hilditch. Egoyan, who was born in Cairo and grew up in Canada, brought an outsider's viewpoint to the film's locations, small-town Ireland and the industrial sprawl of the English Midlands. "I felt a responsibility," he says, "that both locations be presented with honesty and accuracy." Egoyan also found working with British and Irish actors a fresh experience. He praised the calibre of the actors who include newcomer Elaine Cassidy as Felicia and Bob Hoskins as Hilditch. Felicia's Journey is firmly stamped with Egoyan's style and preoccupations. The film includes regular Egoyan collaborators such as DoP Paul Sarossy, editor Susan Shipson and composer Mychael Danna, while the director's muse Arsinee Khanjian plays Hilditch's extraordinary mother Gala. The film's structure jumps back and forward in time, incorporating video and film footage, in a way that will be familiar to Egoyan fans. Felicia's Journey was released in the UK in October last year to critical acclaim.

Synopsis

Birmingham is not exactly renowned as a movie location, but after Atom Egoyan recently put it on the map with Felicia's Journey comes another film set in the city. Justin Edgar and his co-writer Mike Dent both hail from the home of Spaghetti Junction, balti curries and the Bullring, so it was a natural choice as the backdrop for their teen comedy Large, which shot for six weeks on location in Birmingham. The pair had previously collaborated on a short, Larging It, which led to the feature. They teamed up with producer Alex Usborne, whose credits include The Acid House and Tales From A Hard City, and debut director Edgar recruited a young cast of British newcomers as well as studding the film with comic cameos from TV personalities Les Dennis, Morwenna Banks and Phil Cornwell. The film tells the story of young Jason Mousely, who on his 18th birthday is due to inherit a fortune from his late father, rock legend Barry 'Blaze' Mousely. The catch is that to collect his inheritance Jason must show himself to be the opposite of his departed dad - he has to be a responsible citizen with a steady job, a wholesome girlfriend and a respectful attitude to his stepmother. And he has just one day to prove it before he turns 18. Large is produced by Sheffield-based Picture Palace North for FilmFour and The Film Consortium. The title is one of the first from FilmFour Lab's 2000 production slate, with the Lab's Robin Gutch describing it as the ideal film to launch the slate. It is, he says, "an evil brew of bawdy wit and adrenaline-powered comedy, with interior design to die for".