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Get ready to go Back to the Future with a new film that is going into production called Great Scott. Moviehole is reporting that the film is about a teenager in 1980′s Manchester, England who falls so in love with Robert Zemeckis’s 1985 hit that he tries to become Marty McFly. The main character is a slightly despondent working class teenager who would do anything to escape his mundane life and have the kind of adventures Marty McFly did in the hit film.

Phil Hawkins is set to direct the film based on a script by Alex Child and Hiram Bleetman. The project is a joint venture between Philm Company, Sonic Screenworks and Lip Sync. This is the same company that financed such recent films as We Need to Talk About Kevin and Jane Eyre.

Hawkins was one of 16 aspiring directors on the TV show On the Lot, a reality...

An interesting project is in the works that should be of interest to Back to the Future fans. Movie Hole reports that Phil Hawkins (The Butterfly Tattoo) is set to direct Great Scott, a film described as a love letter to 1985’s Back to the Future. The pic centers on a teenager in 1980s Manchester, England who falls so in love with Back to the Future that he tries to actually become Marty McFly (no word on whether or not he goes full-method and comes dangerously close to banging him mom). Alex Child and Hiram Bleetman wrote the script, and the investment firms behind We Need to Talk About Kevin and Jane Eyre are backing the production. Hawkins was actually a contestant on the short-lived “find the next big director” reality series On the Lot, and he’s got two features already under his belt. I’m a self-professed “Back to the Future...

Remember that reality show On the Lot? It was produced by Steven Spielberg and featured several aspiring filmmakers who shot their own short films each week and competed for the top prize of a "dream job" at DreamWorks? The show didn't do so well in the ratings, and wasn't as entertaining as Ben Affleck and Matt Damon's Project Greenlight series, but the contestants who starred have continued to work in the industry, with news arriving today that one of them is now set to direct some sort of Back to the Future love letter called Great Scott. Moviehole tells us that Phil Hawkins (The Butterfly Tattoo) will direct the film, based in England, which centers on a bored teenager living a mundane life who would do anything to live out the adventures of...

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[1] It seems like just about everyone who grew up in the '80s and '90s considers themselves a fan of Robert Zemeckis' Back to the Future movies, and with good reason; that trilogy has held up surprisingly well over the years. But there's being a fan, and then there's being completely and utterly obsessed. Like, try-to-actually-become-Marty-McFly obsessed. Directed by Phil Hawkins, the upcoming Bttf-inspired Great Scott will be about a young man who falls squarely into the latter category. More about the film after the jump. MovieHole [2] reports that Great Scott will focus on an unhappy working class teen in '80s Manchester, England who develops a fixation on the 1985 sci-fi comedy classic and, along with it, a burning desire to leave behind his humdrum life and live out the adventures of his cinematic hero. It's not clear how closely Great Scott will mirror Back to the Future,...

It's been a busy day for indie movies on Empire, what with the new poster for Another Year and another for The Kids Are Alright. And now here's a poster and trailer for a third movie, this time a small-scale British indie called Being Sold.It's the story of a bloke who, following redundancy, puts himself up for sale on an online auction site – ignoring several international and national laws outlawing slavery in the process, we might add. The cast includes Christopher Dane (Born of Hope), Lee Boardman (Rome), Eva Pope (Waterloo Road), Jessica Blake (The Butterfly Tattoo) as well as Chris Hannon (Lunch Monkeys), Lesley Joseph (Birds of a Feather), John Thompson, Terry Christian and Roy Walker.A percentage of the film's box office is apparently going to Amnesty International, and a release date is due to be announced in the next couple of days. Check out the poster...

This week brings a bumper crop of indie and arthouse releases with something to suit all tastes, even if their added box office is outdone by "Crank: High Voltage."

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"American Violet"

In our politically expedient, hyper-add times, director Tim Disney reminds us African-Americans had it tough in the post-civil rights era long before Katrina with this Texas-set drama based on true story. As much a legal thriller as anything else, "American Violet" stars Alfre Woodward as the steely mother of Dee Roberts (Nicole Beharie), a woman wrongly scooped up from the projects amidst a mass drug raid and harassed into a plea bargain. With the help of an Aclu attorney (Tim Blake Nelson) and an ex-cop (Will Patton), she must go up against a callous district attorney (Michael O'Keefe), who's playing a numbers game in pursuit of federal money,...