Thursday, March 28, 2024

Oscar Winners, Nominees Seek “Salvation”

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I’m happy to report that the terrific producers Celine Rattray and Cathy Schulman are helping a bunch of Oscar winners and nominees seek Salvation.

That is, they are getting ready to shoot “Salvation Boulevard” with an all-star cast that includes Oscar winners Jennifer Connelly and Marisa Tomei, and nominees Donald Sutherland, Greg Kinnear, and Ed Harris. If you think that’s a good group, just add former Bond Pierce Brosnan, who’s so good right now in “The Ghost Writer.” (If you haven’t seen the Roman Polanski thriller, you are missing great movie making.)

The indie production is budgeted at $5.5 million. I’m told these intrepid women have raised all but the last $250,000. “Salvation Boulevard” seems like a sound investment. Between the producers and the cast, and director  George Ratliff, they have the combined credentials to make a hit. Ratliff adapted his script from a novel by Larry Beinhart, author of the book that became one of my favorite movies, “Wag the Dog.”

Schulman, meantime, was the driving force behind the Oscar winning “Crash.” She has dozens of credits including one of my guilty pleasure Sundance movies, “Thumbsucker.” Rattray is the founder of Plum Pictures, a plucky indie company with its own set of impressive titles including one of this past Sundance’s best films, :Lisa Cholodenko’s “The Kids Are Alright.” The latter film will get a big Oscar push, I hope, from Focus Features.

So the indie film world lives. I can’t wait to see “Salvation Boulevard” turn out to be one of the happy surprises of 2011.

Roger Friedman
Roger Friedmanhttps://www.showbiz411.com
Roger Friedman began his Showbiz411 column in April 2009 after 10 years with Fox News, where he created the Fox411 column. His movie reviews are carried by Rotten Tomatoes, and he is a member of both the movie and TV branches of the Critics Choice Awards. His articles have appeared in dozens of publications over the years including New York Magazine, where he wrote the Intelligencer column in the mid 90s and covered the OJ Simpson trial, and Fox News (when it wasn't so crazy) where he covered Michael Jackson. He is also the writer and co-producer of "Only the Strong Survive," a selection of the Cannes, Sundance, and Telluride Film festivals, directed by DA Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus.
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