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In
the Cannes: deals
By Rajan Malhotra
WITH shrill voiced
Icelandic songstress Bjork having long boarded the plane clutching her
best actress award, you could be forgiven for thinking that the dust
had now settled upon Europe's most famous film festival.
Yet, Cannes is not only about gushing speeches, sequined dresses and
glittering awards ceremonies - it is, like pretty much everything else
today, about money and more importantly lucrative movie deals. As stars
saunter through the streets of the city, deals are being struck amongst
the great and not so great of the movie world.
One such deal could see the return of an old British favourite, Doctor
Who. After the Doctor's last, truly dull, foray into the world of the
great galactic unknown (in an unmemorable TV movie starring Paul McGann
several years ago), the BBC has decided to dust off its once prized
jewel in the scheduling crown and transform it into a bigscreen movie
backed by a sizeable budget.
The pound signs in former Spice Girl Geri Halliwell's eyes could clearly
be seen glowing as she announced that she had signed a deal with September
Films to star in Therapy, a $10 million film about a woman who falls
in love with her therapist. If Halliwell's last big screen performance
in Spiceworld is anything to go by, the likes of Bjork shouldn't have
too many sleepless nights.
American boy band N'Sync obviously haven't seen Spiceworld, because
if they had they would have decided against attending Cannes to promote
a similar film based upon their own adventures. The word 'promote' is
used loosely here because America's latest teen sensations failed to
tell the press and adoring female public anything of the film's plot.
As they sat nervously alongside representatives of the little known
Total Film Group, the boys were unable to talk about specifics and muttered
in the vaguest of terms that principal photography is due to start in
January.
Elsewhere, Marvel Studios which is due to release the X Men and Spider-Man
films later this year, has signed several deals to ensure that others
from its superhero stable make it onto celluloid. Crystal Sky Entertainment
have agreed to jointly finance a film based upon the Marvel Comic book
character Ghost Rider while hopes are high that at least 15 other Marvel
franchises can be turned into live action features, TV series and internet
projects.
Also in talks during the festival were Robert Redford and Brad Pitt,
both of whom were being courted by Crimson Tide director Tony Scott
to star in his forthcoming espionage thriller Spy Game.
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