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| The image above of Noomi Rapace and Rachel McAdams in Brian De Palma's Passion is courtesy of a New York Times video in which De Palma discusses the film |
...Despite the negotiations with IFC Films revealed this past Monday, Entertainment One (also known as eOne Entertainment) announced today that it has acquired the North American rights to distribute Brian De Palma's Passion. Variety, Hollywood Reporter, Screen Daily, and Deadline all reported the news, adding that Passion will be released in theaters in early 2013. (I got a pretty big laugh out ofThe Wrap's Brent Lang stating that "it's been over a decade since De Palma was a critics' darling." Was he ever so loved by what we might call "the critics"?)
Regarding Passion, the Deadline team states that "the deal was negotiated by ICM Partners along with SBS’ Saïd Ben Saïd and eOne’sDavid Reckziegel and Sejin Croninger; ICM Partners also reps De Palma." The Hollywood Reporter quotes Reckziegel (the president of eOne Films North America)-- "Rachel McAdams' and Noomi Rapace's performances are captivating and De Palma delivers another great thriller that audiences have already embraced at Venice and Toronto."
...According to Robert Cashill, the New York Film Festival has added a screening of Passion to make up for the cancelled screening last night. The make-up screening is set for Saturday, October 6, at 10am. The film will also screen at 9pm that evening, as well as tomorrow afternoon at 1pm, and Thursday, October 11th, at 3:15pm.
Meanwhile, The Moveable Fest's Stephen Saito provides a detailed account of how it all went down last night:
..."If such a cruel fate was going to befall a director as what occurred at Alice Tully Hall on Saturday night at the New York Film Festival, at least Brian De Palma knows a thing or two about sabotage from his work. In attendance for the premiere of his latest thriller Passion, the director had promised the audience was 'going to have fun,' but just after his introduction and the festival’s bumper trailer played, the screen went dark and the lights came up. Soon, the festival’s programming director Richard Peña emerged onstage to tell the audience that something had gone wrong with the film’s digital projection.
"Sitting on the right wing of the hall’s balcony, intended to be a public spot where a spotlight is traditionally drawn at the end of a film at the festival to garner an ovation, De Palma never left his seat, seemingly unflustered by this chain of events but not unconcerned. At first, arms crossed and then forming a temple with his hands triangulated at the bridge of his nose as if he were the Godfather, De Palma was consulted [by] Film Society of Lincoln Center programmer Scott Foundas, who in true consigliere fashion, would lean in on his left to give updates. Indeed, by the time Richard Peña appeared onstage once more to tell the audience he was 'mortified' to report the projectionists had no further luck, a hit had happened and like a quick cut in one of his films, De Palma had vanished.
"Only an hour earlier, Peña had been across the street at the Elinor Bunin Film Center’s Amphitheater reflecting back on some of the best and worst experiences he had in programming the New York Film Festival as part of a panel on the festival's selection committee. While he could laugh now about opening night miscalculations such as the Coen Brothers' Miller's Crossing, which Phillip Lopate chalked up to the acoustics at Avery Fisher Hall as much as the film’s grim tenor, he surely never endured a situation like what happened Saturday night. He told the audience at the Passionscreening that the projectionists had unlocked the code that allowed the movie to be shown and tested a few minutes from it before audiences entered Alice Tully Hall, but when Passion was intended to ease into its place following the NYFF bumper, it had somehow locked up once more, with what one can assume were panicked calls to Technicolor and others to find a solution."