Alison Thompson, co-president of Focus Features International announced numerous sales on Academy Award and BAFTA-winning director Kevin Macdonald's (LAST KING of SCOTLAND, TOUCHING the VOID) heist thriller, BLACK SEA starring two-time Academy Award®-nominee Jude Law (SHERLOCK HOLMES, ANNA KARENINA). In a multi territory deal Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisition (SPWA) acquired Germany, Austria, German speaking Switzerland, Eastern Europe, Scandinavia, and Latin America. Backup Media invested against distribution rights in France, Benelux and French speaking Switzerland; E-Stars acquired China; Top Films the CIS; E1 Australia and New Zealand; Lev Cinema Israel; Ster-Kinekor South Africa; and Focus Features International is currently fielding offers in several other territories.

Kevin Macdonald and Charles Steel are producing the film which stars Law as a modern-day submarine captain who is laid off by the salvage company he works for. Desperate to get even with his former employers and to prove himself, he is approached by a shadowy backer. Handed command of a submarine that is barely seaworthy, he is to rally a gang of English and Russian die-hard seafarers, outcasts and/or psychopaths all, on a mission. Their quarry is a storied sunken submarine, said to be loaded with lost gold, lying at the bottom of disputed waters in the Black Sea. The captain and his crew will have to go to the depths – in more ways than one – to get the loot. The closer they get to the prize, the riskier it becomes to trust one another.
                     

If you didn't catch it, Patton Oswalt made a serious claim for "King of the Nerds" last month. A video from the set of "Parks and Recreation" was posted online showing the comedian/actor explaining, at incredible length, his very specific plot idea for J.J. Abrams' STAR WARS EPISODE VII, which would also tie into the Marvel Cinematic Universe as well as multiple other film franchises. It was such a great display of geekiness that it inspired many others to get creative. Shortly after the video's release an artist created a very special mash-up poster containing all of the cool details, but now, as you can see here, YouTube user iZacLess has taken it to another level. 

It remains a shame that, for now, studio politics and character rights are preventing characters like Spider-Man and the X-Men from showing up in a film with The Avengers, but at least there is a loud voice calling for what we want: bigger, cooler universes. And who knows, perhaps this video could somehow land Oswalt a role in either an upcoming STAR WARS or Marvel movie. I certainly wouldn't mind it.

In addition to his recent appearance on "Parks and Rec," Oswalt has been keeping busy on the small screen, starring in episodes of "The Newsroom," "Justified," and "Two and a Half Men." On the big screen he has a role in Ben Stiller's The SECRET LIFE of WALTER MITTY and Stephen Sommers' adaptation of the popular Dean Koontz novel ODD THOMAS.

Primeridian Entertainment Launches With Feature On Nobel Prize-Winning Soviet Dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn
Primeridian Entertainment has hired Cyrus Nowrasteh (The STONING of SORAYA M., The DAY REAGAN WAS SHOT) to write and direct a feature film based on the life of  the famed Soviet dissident and Nobel Prize winning author Alexander Solzhenitsyn. The picture will be produced and equity financed by Primeridian's Arcadiy Golubovich and Tim O'Hair.  This marks the first feature under the Primeridian Entertainment banner.  As source material, the company has optioned the rights to D.M. Thomas' prize winning Alexander Solzhenitsyn: A Century in His Life, a biography of the author. Nowrasteh will pen the script with his wife, Betsy Giffen Nowrasteh, with whom he recently collaborated on the Ann Rice adaptation "Christ the Lord." 

"It's a privilege to tell the courageous story of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn," said writer director Cyrus Nowrasteh.  "Millions suffered and died in the Soviet labor camps. As a survivor, he resolved to tell the world about it. The power of his pen, despite the suppression of his work and every effort to silence his voice, helped bring about the downfall of one of the greatest tyrannies mankind has ever known."

"We have long been attracted to the complex and remarkable life of Alexander Solzhenitsyn, who had a significant impact on the Soviet Union," said Arcadiy Golubovich, head of Primeridian Entertainment.  "As a Russian nonconformist and activist as well as a towering literary figure, Solzhenitsyn's life makes for a compelling feature film, and we are thrilled to be bringing Cyrus' talent on board to weave this fascinating story."

Alexander Solzhenitsyn was a Red Army officer who, after being accused of anti-Soviet propaganda, was imprisoned by Stalin in the gulag system in February of 1945.   The period later became the basis for his monumental The Gulag Archipelago, a three-volume book narrating his experiences in the Soviet forced labor camp system, unacknowledged during the Stalinist era.  Solzhenitsyn's other works include "The First Circle," "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich," "Cancer Ward," and "The Red Wheel."  He won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1970, was expelled from the former Soviet Union in 1974, and lived in exile in Vermont until he was able to return to Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the mid-1990s.  Solzhenitsyn died in 2008. 

British prize winning novelist and poet D.M. Thomas won the Orwell Prize in 1999 for penning Solzhenitsyn's biography.  Other awards include the Los Angeles Fiction prize for his novel "The White Hotel," an international bestseller translated into 30 languages.

Nowrasteh wrote and directed the acclaimed Paramount/Showtime production The DAY REAGAN WAS SHOT, executive produced by Oliver Stone, as well as The STONING OF SORAYA M, released by Roadside Attractions in 2008.  He also wrote ABC's controversial THE PATH TO 9/11, directed by David L. Cunningham.
                         

Academy Award® Nominated Actor Samuel L. Jackson Joins Hailee Steinfeld In BARELY LETHAL

Highland Film Group to handle international sales of the film produced by RKO Pictures with Brett Ratner's Rat Entertainment and Hopscotch Pictures