Fox Searchlight has paid $5 million for most of the world rights to Clark Gregg‘s Choke, adapted by Gregg from Chuck Palahniuk‘s novel of the same name. Sam Rockwell and Anjelica Huston costar. Coming to theatres in…August? September? Early ’09?

With the death of Heath Ledger, director Terry Gilliam‘s The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus is in a tight spot, to put it mildly. Ledger is/was the star of Gilliam’s fantasy film, which shot exterior scenes in London last month but, according to a Wikipedia summary, has more shooting to do in Vancouver.

Heath Ledger during last month’s London filming of The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus.

Parnassus is set in London, so the Vancouver scenes will presumably be interiors, which usually constitute the bulk of any film unless you’re shooting Lawrence of Arabia. If Ledger’s planned Vancouver interiors aren’t that extensive, maybe Gilliam can fudge some of his unshot scenes with some CG cut and paste work, as Ridley Scott did with the late Oliver Reed‘s footage in Gladiator.
Adam Dawtrey‘s 1.23 Variety piece about this situation says that “blue-screen work [on Parnassus] was due to start in Vancouver next week and continue until early March.” He also wrote that “the producers have yet to issue any statement about how or whether they plan to proceed without Ledger.”
Gilliam is no stranger to massive film-shoot calamity, as anyone who’s seen Keith Fulton and Louis Pepe‘s Lost in La Mancha will tell you. It’s about the awful luck that plagued the shooting of Gilliam’s The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, which led to the whole thing being scrubbed.
Of course, The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus was plagued anyway with one of the worst titles in the history of cinema, so Ledger’s death double-fucks it.
Parnassus is operating on a reported budget of $30 million, according to Wikipedia. Production began in December 2007 at London’s Battersea Power Station, Tower Bridge, and St. Paul’s Cathedral.
Gilliam and Adventures of Baron Munchausen collaborator Charles McKeown co-wrote the script for The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. It’s a present-day piece about a thousand-year-old Doctor Parnassus (Christopher Plummer) “leading a traveling theater troupe and offering audience members a chance to go beyond reality through a magical mirror in his possession,” the Wiki summary says.
“Parnassus had been able to guide the imagination of others through a deal with the Devil (Tom Waits), who now comes to collect on the arrangement, targeting the doctor’s daughter (Lily Cole). The troupe, who is joined by a mysterious outsider (Ledger) embark through parallel worlds to rescue the girl.”
Dawtrey’s piece also reports that Ledger had been “working on what would have been his feature directing debut, an adaptation of the Walter Tevis novel ‘The Queen’s Gambit,’ with British writer/producer Allan Scott.
“The leading role of a young female chess prodigy had been offered to Oscar nominee Ellen Page. Ledger, himself a highly rated chess player, was due to play a supporting role.
“In an interview last month, a few days after shooting started on Doctor Parnassus, Gilliam said, ‘Heath is extraordinary. He’s just so good, and he’s going to be a film director. He’s watching everything, and he’s going to be a much better director than I will ever be.'”

The Sundance Film Festival is a 10-day event, but it’s always over as of Wednesday morning, or five and a half days after the opening-night festivities on Thursday night. The voltage turns down, there are fewer people on Main Street, all the presumably hot titles (i.e., name casts, advance-hyped) have been screened. I was going to stay until Friday but with this virus in my system and the general enervation and lack of excitement I’m figuring “screw it.” I’m on the phone to Southwest right now, get myself on a plane tomorrow morning.
Sundance ’08 wasn’t bad but it sure wasn’t great. There was a general feeling of deflation, an almost-but-not-quite vibe. There was no surprise knockout…no Little Miss Sunshine, no Once. Film after film seemed to fall short in this or that way. More than a few were greeted with “respectful but tepid applause,” to quote a college film professor who had just come from The Mysteries of Pittsburgh. Nobody except Variety‘s Bob Koehler came up to me and said, “You have to see this film!” Over and over I heard qualifiers — “not bad,” “I was okay with it,” “Almost worked,” “didn’t blow my socks off,” etc.
I saw five films that I was genuinely aroused and moved by — In Bruges, Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired, Patti Smith: Dream of Life, Dog Eat Dog (Perro Come Perro) and The Escapist. Everything else was a half-and-halfer, a “meh” or an outright dud.
I admired the pared-down, Lars von Trier-like atmosphere of Lance Hammer‘s Ballast, which I saw the day before yesterday, but I also found it draggy and almost comatose at times. There were something like 15 movies here that dealt with suicide. I only saw the beginning of American Teen, which Paramount Vantage is apparently buying, but I was instantly bored by its focus on four cliched high-school archetypes.
I missed tons of films. That’s normal, of course. You can’t possibly see everything you want to see. I play it like anyone else, starting out with my own list and ready to shift gears any time I hear about a really special film. But with very few exceptions, all I heard about were films that vaguely disappointed. Or I passed along the bad news myself. Barry Levinson‘s What Just Happened? never connected for me — wasn’t believable, lacked heart, emotionally aloof characters. I was mostly “meh” with Mark Pellington‘s Henry Poole Is Here as it struck me as overly gloomy and enervated. And so on.
I should have seen Choke, Hamlet 2 and Sleepwalking. Getting sick yesterday and being sick today is my best excuse. The virus just took over, although I managed to bang out a few Oscar nomination reactions. I was sleeping on a couch when a friend called in the mid-afternoon about the death of Heath Ledger, so I got up and tapped out an okay-this-happened piece. Then I crashed again.
I have to get out of here. I want only to escape. I just want to leave it all behind and start over in warmer weather.

The life and career of Heath Ledger, a deeply talented guy who sometimes played romantic heroes and at other times quirky loner roles that worked against his dashing good looks, is over. The brooding 28 year-old was found dead in a Manhattan Broome Street apartment earlier this afternoon.

A CNN report says “a possible drug overdose was suspected” but a city desk N.Y. Times story says “signs pointed to a suicide.”

This is not a cause for weeping as much as a cause for anger and indignation. Brilliant, Heath! I knew him to say hello to, having bonded slightly during the 2005 Toronto Film Festival showings of Brokeback Mountain. He never gave me a guarded response to questions, was always cool about encounters. He liked to scrunch his face up instead of smile when I took his picture. He was shy, private, “moody.” Maybe he should have allowed less of those feelings in because this is totally friggin’ ridiculous. Heath Ledger dead?

A long lifetime of great performances lay ahead for Ledger. He could have easily kept working into old age as he never gave a damn about playing hunks — and now his life is over, his daughter (whom he had with ex-wife Michelle Williams) is father-less, and Warner Bros. is looking at some kind of uncertain future for The Dark Knight, which Ledger plays “The Joker” alongside costars Christian Bale and Michael Caine.

We all know what Warner Bros., the distributor of Chris Nolan‘s second Batman film, is going to say about this this tragic news. They’ll say the same thing that Warner Bros. said about James Dean‘s death when he was killed in a car crash in September 1955 with two movies yet to open — Rebel Without a Cause and Giant. They’ll say “this is a very sad time for all of us, and not a time for discuss grosses.”

But you know and I know that the WB hardballers are asking themselves right now, “Will this adversely impact the Dark Knight box-office or will it enhance it, or will it have no impact?” The latter, I would think.

The Times story says that Ledger “was found dead this afternoon in an apartment in Manhattan, according to the New York City police. Signs pointed to a suicide, police sources said. Mr. Ledger was 28.

“At 3:31 p.m., a masseuse arrived at Apartment 5A in the building, at 421 Broome Street in SoHo, for an appointment with Mr. Ledger, the police said. The masseuse was let in to the home by a housekeeper, who then knocked on the door of the bedroom Mr. Ledger was in. When no one answered, the housekeeper and the masseuse opened the bedroom and found Mr. Ledger naked and unconscious on a bed, with pills scattered around his body. They shook him, but he did not respond. They immediately called the authorities.”
“The police said they did not suspect foul play.”

Ledger was nominated for an Academy Award in early ’06 for his performance as a closeted sheepherder in Ang Lee‘s Brokeback Mountain.

Here’s an updated 6 pm version of the N.Y. Times story.

I have a virus-fever in my system and it aches, it’s exhausting and it’s slowing me down with the postings. An hour ago I leaned over on the bench at the Star Hotel breakfast table and went to sleep. So we’re lookiing at a Sundance shut-down today and perhaps also tomorrow. Staying indoors, drinking liquids, sleeping (if I can). I’ll try and get into more stuff when I wake up.

Listen to this Patti Smith stage rant called “Declaration”, which is heard in Patti Smith: Dream of Life. Her monumental rage and phrasings are electric, breathtaking…especially during the last half. Smith told me she re-records and re-posts it on her website every year.

Not quite the full remainder of this morning’s Oscar nominations, with predictions and quips:
BEST FOREIGN FILM: Beaufort, Israel; The Counterfeiters, Austria; Katyn, Poland; Mongol, Kazakhstan; and 12, Russia. The year’s finest foreign language film is 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days. The people who excluded it are morons and need to be identified and divested of power. What Will Win?: Nobody cares. The whole category has been soiled by the 4 Months brouhaha.
BEST ANIMATED FILM: Persepolis, Ratatouille and Surf’s Up. What Will Win?: Ratatouille.
BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY: Juno, Lars & the Real Girl, Michael Clayton, Ratatouille, The Savages. Who/What Will Win?: Diablo Cody for Juno or Tony Gilroy for Michael Clayton.
BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY: Atonement, Away from Her, The Diving Bell & the Butterfly, No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood. Who/What Will Win?: The Coens’ No Country screenplay.
BEST ART DIRECTION: American Gangster, Atonement, The Golden Compass, Sweeney Todd and There Will Be Blood. Who/What Will Win?: Sweeney Todd as a makeup for getting Best Picture snubbed.
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY: The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Atonement, The Diving Bell & the Butterfly, No Country for Old Men, There Will Be Blood. Who/What Will Win?: Roger Deakins for Jesse James.
BEST DOCUMENTARY FILM: No End in Sight, Operation Homecoming, Sicko, Taxi to the Dark Side, War/Dance. Who/What Will Win?: No End in Sight.
BEST SOUND MIXING: The Bourne Ultimatum, No Country for Old Men, Ratatouille, 3:10 to Yuma and Transformers. Who/What Will Win?: Dunno…No Country? Which had excellent sound. (Remember how you can hear Javier Bardem unscrewing of the light bulb in the second-floor hallway of the small Texas hotel.) But please, please, please not Transformers!
BEST SOUND EDITING: The Bourne Ultimatum, No Country for Old Men, Ratatouille, There Will Be Blood
and Transformers. Who/What Will Win?: No clue at all. Anyone?
BEST FILM EDITING: The Bourne Ultimatum, The Diving Bell & the Butterfly, Into the Wild, No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood. Who/What Will Win?: I would say Bourne Ultimatum, but I haven’t a clue.
BEST ORIGINAL SCORE: Atonement, The Kite Runner, Michael Clayton, Ratatouille and 3:10 to Yuma.
BEST ORIGINAL SONG: “Falling Slowly,” Once; “Happy Working Song,” Enchanted; “Raise It Up,” August Rush; “So Close,” Enchanted; “That’s How You Know,” Enchanted. Who/What Will Win?: It has to be Glenn Hansard and Marketa Irglova for Once…right?
I’m too fevered and fatigued to type out the last four categories today. I’ll get to it tomorrow or whatever. I’ve got a bad-ass virus and intending to lay low today.

Just for the record, this morning’s Academy nominations plus predictions and scattered reactions:
BEST PICTURE: Atonement, Juno, Michael Clayton, No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood. (Juno doesn’t belong with the other four — in a better world, being “really likable” and making lots of money wouldn’t translate into a Best Picture nom, especially with masterpieces like Zodiac and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford being cold-shouldered, and with a much more affecting spiritual delight like Once also getting the shaft.) What Will Win?: No Country for Old Men….I think.
BEST DIRECTOR: Paul Thomas Anderson, There Will Be Blood; Joel & Ethan Coen, No Country for Old Men; Tony Gilroy, Michael Clayton; Jason Reitman, Juno; and Julian Schnabel, The Diving Bell & the Butterfly. (Schabel’s is an attaboy/gmme nomination — meaningless without a Butterfly Best Picture nom.) Who Will Win?: the Coen boys.
BEST ACTOR: George Clooney, Michael Clayton (still don’t get this…a very strong and lived-in performance and Clooney’s second best perf ever after Syriana, but it doesn’t meet my criteria for “award-quality” — how about a nomination for Sturdiest Lead Male performance?); Daniel “I drink your milkshake” Day-Lewis, There Will Be Blood; Johnny Depp, Sweeney Todd; Tommy Lee Jones, In the Valley of Elah; Viggo Mortensen, Eastern Promises. (“I yam Rauhssian and good with a knife, and if you attack me in a steam bath I will fight you in a way that will get the attention of certain female journalists.”) Who Will Win?: Lewis.
BEST ACTRESS: Cate Blanchett, Elizabeth: The Golden Age (what?…welcome to the clueless blue-hair vote…aesthetically-challenged empties who are enormously impressed by histrionics and costumes); Julie Christie, Away from Her; Marion Cotillard, La Vie En Rose; Laura Linney, The Savages (well deserved); Ellen Page, Juno. Who Will Win?: Between Christie and Cotillard. HE has stood by Cotillard all the way. She should win unless the oldies get together and decided to give Christie, who is superb in Away From Her, an admiration-plus-nostalgia vote.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR: Casey Affleck, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford; Javier Bardem, No Country for Old Men; Philip Seymour Hoffman, Charlie Wilson’s War (Toby Kebbell, the guy who played the same kind of smart-ass character in Control, was better); Hal Holbrook, Into the Wild; Tom Wilkinson, Michael Clayton. Who Will Win?: Bardem.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Cate Blanchett, I’m Not There; Ruby Dee, American Gangster; Saoirse Ronan, Atonement; Amy Ryan, Gone Baby Gone; Tilda Swinton, Michael Clayton (well deserved). Who Will Win?: It’s between Blanchett and Ryan.
More to come in a few….

With a Best Picture nomination under its belt, I guess it’s not appropriate to use “poor” as an Atonement adjective any more. The fact that Joe Wright didn’t get a Best Director nomination means the Academy voters liked it mainly for “soft” reasons — Brideshead Revisited vibe, moving love story, period sets and costumes. But Atonement nonetheless received three prestige-level nominations — Best Picture, Best Supporting Actress (Saoirse Ronan) and Best Adapted Screenplay.
The four “soft” Atonement nominations are for Best Art Direction, Best Cinematography, Best Score and Best Costume Design.
As noted elsewhere, No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood got eight nominations each — cheers and a clink of glasses for Miramax (which landed 21 nominations in total) and Paramount Vantage.
Michael Clayton earned six nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director (Tony Gilroy), Best Actor (George Clooney), Best Supporting Actor (Tom Wilkinson) and Best Supporting Actress (Tilda Swinton). Ratatouille, The Diving Bell & the Butterfly and Juno were handed four nominations each. The Bourne Ultimatum, Enchanted, Sweeney Todd and Transformers got three each.

Sundance rigors have made me sick — bod feels enervated, head feels virusy — but in my limited capacity I’m seeing at least one surprise among the just-announced Oscar nominees: Tommy Lee Jones being nommed as Best Actor for his performance in In The Valley of Elah. I called it for Jones in the Oscar Balloon all along, but I’m not aware of many other Oscar handicappers who did the same. This seems to me like a back-pat for the movie, for director-writer Paul Haggis…and a little bit of a slapdown for all the Elah dissers.
And you’d have to call Johnny Depp‘s getting a Best Actor nomination for Sweeney Todd a surprise also. Depp’s biggest supporter, The Envelope‘s Tom O’Neil, looked at the indicators and wrote his chances off not too long ago. In a similar semi-passionate way, the Depp nomination is about Academy members giving a half-assed back-pat for Sweeney Todd, which they didn’t like (much less love) enough to give a Best Picture nomination to.