News

Exclusive: Malcom McDowell (A Clockwork Orange) and Alex Hassell (Rivals) will star in crime thriller Dog & Bull, with Essential Film Group launching sales on pic at the EFM.

Written and directed by James Marquand (Dead Man’s Cards), the feature from Blackwater Pictures also stars Sinead Cusack (Napoleon), Lara Peake (How to Have Sex), Francis Magee (Layer Cake), Bobby Schofield (Cherry) and Paul Barber (The Full Monty). Tiernan Handy is producing along with Kevin Harvey, Simon Marriott and Antoine Dixon-Bellot, and Essential has boarded for worldwide sales.

Per the synopsis, Dog & Bull is billed as “a dark, hard-boiled crime-thriller, with black comedy undertones, in which legendary actor McDowell stars as a fugitive criminal hiding out as a pub landlord who questions his identity when he gets discovered by a psychotic hitman (Hassell), who is also his biggest fan.”

McDowell grew up as the son of a publican, who ran a...

Cast includes ‘A Clockwork Orange’ star Malcolm McDowell and Morgane Polański.

UK sales, production and distribution outfit Signature Entertainment has boarded global sales for Second World War spy thriller The Partisan, with a cast including French-Polish Vikings star Morgane Polański and A Clockwork Orange actor Malcolm McDowell.

Sales are launching at this month’s Cannes.

UK filmmaker James Marquand directs. His previous credits include Edinburgh International Film Festival premiere Dead Man’s Cards.

The title, currently in production in France, is Inspired by the true story of Krystyna Skarbek (Polański), a Polish spy working for the British behind enemy lines during the Second World War.

Bringing first-time screenwriter Stephen Morris’ tale to the big screen, James Marquand’s Between Two Worlds follows struggling writer Ryan, recently dumped and under copious amounts of pressure from his tight suited, slave driving agent to produce his next masterpiece. Though initially there’s much promise in the film’s set-up, eventually it all tumbles downhill miserably in a sea

The post Between Two Worlds Review appeared first on HeyUGuys.

Smartly timed for release in the week the 2015 Rugby World Cup kicks off, this breezy and joyous documentary offers an interesting take on a changing game. Written and directed by James Marquand (One Night In Istanbul), with sporadic narration from Brian Cox (the X2 actor, not the TV professor), it’s a worthy attempt to

The post Pacific Warriors Review appeared first on HeyUGuys.

Untitled Robert Zemeckis Project

Marion Cotillard is set to join Brad Pitt in an untitled project at Paramount Pictures which Robert Zemeckis is slated to direct. Steven Knight penned the period spy thriller which will be shot before Pitt gets to work on the "World War Z" sequel which Juan Antonio Bayona directs. [Source: Deadline]

Beautiful Devils

Iain Glen ("Game of Thrones") has joined the cast of James Marquand's psychological thriller "Beautiful Devils" which began filming in London last week. The project is described as a contemporary music business version of "Othello". Filming began last week around areas of East London ahead of a Spring 2016 release. [Source: Variety]

Goon: Last of the Enforcers

Elisha Cuthbert has joined the cast of the upcoming sports comedy sequel "Goon: Last of the Enforcers" starring Seann William Scott, Jay Baruchel, Liev Schreiber and Alison Pill. Filming begins June 21st in Toronto.

Scott plays hockey enforcer Doug 'the...

Iain Glen cast in a modern take on Othello, set in the world of the music business.

Principal photography has begun in east London psychological thriller Beautiful Devils and will shoot until July 5.

The modern adaptation of Shakespeare’s Othello is set in the world of the contemporary music business, with a cast that includes Iain Glen, seen most recently in Game of Thrones but also known for his roles in Resident Evil and Lara Croft: Tomb Raider.

The cast also includes Osy Ikhile (Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation), Elliot James Langridge (Northern Soul), Rachel Hurd-Wood (Peter Pan) and Danny Horn (Emmerdale) as well as comedian Rufus Hound in his debut feature and Steve Waddington (The Imitation Game).

Produced by London-based Ascension Productions, Beautiful Devils is directed by James Marquand and produced by Ascension’s Craig Tuohy alongside Carnaby International’s Andrew Loveday, Mike Loveday and Terry Loveday.

Carnaby International has worldwide sales and distribution rights.

A theatrical...

Exclusive: Titles include thriller The Barber starring Scott Glenn.

London/La-based outfit The Little Film Company has added a hat trick of titles to its slate on the eve of the Cannes Marche.

The first is Basel Owies’ thriller, The Barber, starring Scott Glenn and newcomer Chris Coy (Deliver Us From Evil).

They play a serial killer masquerading as a small town barber and a young man looking to get into the business of murder.

The second title is romantic drama Patrick’s Day, written and directed by first-timer Terry McMahon, starring Kerry Fox, Moe Dunford and Philip Jackson.

The film centres on a young man with mental health issues who becomes intimate with a suicidal flight attendant before his obsessive mother enlists a dysfunctional cop to separate them.

The final title is comedy One Night In Istanbul, directed by James Marquand, starring Steve Waddington (The Imitation Game), Paul Barber, Lucien Laviscount ([link...

Who are the stars of tomorrow in TV, film and theatre?

Digital Spy presents its predictions for 2015 - in no particular order, here are seven young actors, writers, comedians and musicians who look destined to make an impression on the world of entertainment this year.

1. Billy Howle

After graduating from the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School in 2013, Billy Howle quickly landed television work in Channel 4's New Worlds and on ITV's Vera.

But the young actor first came to our attention last year with his powerful performance as the troubled James in sorely underrated countryside thriller Glue.

Next up for the talented Howle is a plum role in BBC One's adaptation of Laurie Lee's Cider with Rosie, which is due to be broadcast later in 2015.

2. Hannah Britland

A graduate from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, Hannah Britland launched her television acting career with early roles in Misfits and Skins.

Following-up his well received freshman feature I Against I, director James Marquand (son of Return of the Jedi director Richard Marquand, fact fans!) returns with One Night in Istanbul, the screen adaptation of the hit play about the exploits of a group of Liverpool Football fans at the European Cup final in Istanbul.

Starring Steven Waddington (The Sweeney, Waterloo Road), Paul Barber (The Invisibles, Only Fools and Horses) and Lucien Laviscount (Trollied), we have the distinct pleasure in revealing the first poster for the film. Check out the poster below, and be sure to give the film a thumbs up on the official Facebook page.

Two down on their luck Liverpool cabbies, Tommy and Gerry, strike an unusual deal with a local gangster to take their sons on a trip of a lifetime, to watch their beloved football team play in the European Cup Final in Istanbul. Hoping to use...

I Against I

Stars: Kenny Doughty, Ingvar Eggert Sigurdsson, Mark Womack, Sónia Balacó | Written by Mark Cripps, David Ellison | Directed by Mark Cripps, David Ellison, James Marquand

If you’re an action movie fan you’re probably familiar with the phrase “two men enter, one man leaves”, but what if that principle, normally reserved for fight arenas, was taken to the streets of London?

Set in the nocturnal underworld in London, I Against I sees Tommy Carmichael, the head of a criminal family, viciously murdered. Distraught, his son Joseph (Womack) wants answers and somebody needs to pay. Ian (Doughty) and Issac (Sigurdssson) were both caught on CCTV separately leaving his office, both denying they are the assassin, they now have to un-wittingly kill each other. Locked in a nightmare of murder, betrayal and jealousy they fight for everything that is important to them – but when a sinister third party complicates...

Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry (15)

(Alison Klayman, 2012, Us) Ai Weiwei, Danqing Chen, Ying Gao. 91 mins

Art and activism merge in this fascinating inside portrait of China's best known artist, which conveys both the roots of Ai's provocations and the authorities' paranoid responses to them. He comes across as a fearless creator, a reluctant hero, a committed campaigner and a fallible human being, treading a perilous line between the adoring global art market and China's Kafkaesque state apparatus.

360 (15)

(Fernando Meirelles, 2011, UK/Aus/Fra/Bra) Rachel Weisz, Anthony Hopkins, Jude Law. 110 mins

Suffering from a surfeit of international stars and locations, this join-the-dots drama zips between a series of emotional episodes without ever gaining much momentum.

The Dinosaur Project (12A)

(Sid Bennett, 2012, UK) Natasha Loring, Matt Kane, Peter Brooke. 83 mins

Chatty Brit explorers regret discovering a modern-day Lost World in the Congo in this low-budget cross between Monsters and Jurassic Park.

The Forgiveness Of Blood (12A)

(Joshua Marston,...

★☆☆☆☆ It would appear that the old adage 'too many cooks spoil the broth' also applies within the context of filmmaking, as made painfully evident by the newly-released, tri-directed British crime drama I Against I (2012). With Mark Cripps, David Ellison and James Marquand all credited with spending time in the hot-seat, it's easy to see why the results are so markedly underwhelming. A weak, woefully written script does the film no favours at all, only to be further accentuated by a number of remarkably lacklustre performances.

Read more »...

The awkwardly titled “I Against I” is a new British thriller from writer director James Marquand, son of Richard Marquand, best known for helming “Return of the Jedi” and “Jagged Edge” back in the 1980s. The film is a complex, noir-tinged affair, with a twisting, cat and mouse plot played out against a stylishly modern London background, its events taking place over the course of a single night and intertwined with flashbacks. Without giving too much away, things kick off with a businessman called Drake (Kenny Doughty, “The Incident”) being snatched by the ruthless gangster Joseph (Mark Womack, “Route Irish”), who accuses him of having killed his father Tommy (veteran Brit television actor John Castle). Although Drake denies the murder, Joseph has CCTV footage of him in the building at the time of the crime, and with Tommy having owed him money, the pieces seem to fit. When Drake claims...

I Against I

Stars: Kenny Doughty, Ingvar Eggert Sigurdsson, Mark Womack, Sónia Balacó | Written by Mark Cripps, David Ellison | Directed by Mark Cripps, David Ellison, James Marquand

If you’re an action movie fan you’re probably familiar with the phrase “two men enter, one man leaves”, but what if that principle, normally reserved for fight arenas, was taken to the streets of London?

Set in the nocturnal underworld in London, I Against I sees Tommy Carmichael, the head of a criminal family, viciously murdered. Distraught, his son Joseph (Womack) wants answers and somebody needs to pay. Ian (Doughty) and Issac (Sigurdssson) were both caught on CCTV separately leaving his office, both denying they are the assassin, they now have to un-wittingly kill each other. Locked in a nightmare of murder, betrayal and jealousy they fight for everything that is important to them – but when a sinister third party complicates...