Atom Egoyan

[MacGuffin]

Atom Egoyan Ready To Shoot A Feature Based On The West Memphis Three Called 'Devil's Knot'
Related Documentary, 'Paradise Lost 3' Getting New Ending; Oscar-Qualifying Run
Source: Playlist

Well, that was fast. No sooner were the West Memphis Three freed on Friday that Hollywood struck while the iron was hot. Canadian filmmaker Atom Egoyan ("Chloe," "The Sweet Hereafter") revealed his intentions to direct a feature-length drama, called "The Devil's Knot," based on the true-life story of three teenagers, known collectively as the West Memphis Three, who were convicted of the murder and sexual mutilation of three 8-year-old boys in 1993. As the teenagers were fans of heavy metal music (and especially Metallica), the prosecution in the case suggested the motive behind the slayings was part of a Satanic ritual. Even with incredibly questionable police work—which many felt to be outrageous—sensationalized media, fear and panic from the satanism angle in the trial led to the teens' conviction and sentence of life imprisonment.

This decades-long story took a dramatic and triumphant turn on Friday when, under a plea bargain, the three individuals, Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley were freed immediately after 18 years in prison.

However, before you deem Egoyan's movie a quick, cynical cash-grab, know that a script by Scott Derrickson and Paul Boardman, the screenwriters behind, "The Exorcism of Emily Rose," has been in the works since 2006. Perhaps presciently—or aware of the behind-the-scenes actions being taken towards the trio's freedom—Egoyan began working to refine the script six weeks ago with Boardman. It's based on Mara Leveritt's 2003 investigative journalism book "Devil's Knot: The True Story of the West Memphis Three." The picture is aiming to start production in the Spring of 2012. The project was once set up at Dimension Films, but they put it in turnaround when the company's then-president Richard Saperstein left and then became involved as a producer afterward.

Since 1996, documentary filmmakers Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky ("Brother's Keeper") have been chronicling the story of The West Memphis Three. The first documentary in what is now a trio of pictures, "Paradise Lost," followed the arrests, trial and conviction of the three men (due to the heavy metal connections and condemnations, "Paradise Lost" is the first film to feature the music of Metallica, a band who up until then were notorious for never licensing their music for any commercial venture).

In 2000, Berlinger and Sinofsky made "Paradise Lost 2: Revelations," a sequel documentary that brought further light and evidence to the case that could have exonerated the men, but eventually came to no avail. However, in the court of public opinion, many felt the men were innocent, making the trio a cause célèbre for artists like Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh, Metallica, Henry Rollins, Eddie Vedder, Johnny Depp and more to lend their support to the case (Jackson and Walsh were privately funding the case for years, it was revealed recently).

While the men were freed on Friday, their victory was bittersweet and legal absolution did not arrive. Under the terms of the plea bargain, Echols, Baldwin and Misskelley all had to plead guilty and were credited with time served. "I am innocent of these charges but I am entering an Alford guilty plea," Echols, who was on death row, told the judge in the case.

No physical evidence connected them to the crime, but prosecutors maintained that the murders contained the signs of "the occult" and that the teenagers shared a "state of mind" that suggested they were the killers. Making matters worse, after eight hours of dubious questioning, police announced that one of the men had implicated himself and accused the two other teenagers. While he recanted hours later, the damage had been done.

The timing could not be any better for Berlinger and Sinofsky, who have been working on "Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory," which will now receive an Oscar-qualifying limited theatrical run before it airs on HBO. And or, creatively, the timing couldn't be worse, as the duo has essentially completed the documentary which will premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival next month as is without a new ending, but were in court in Arkansas on Friday to document the trio's belated victory. A revamped and final version of the film will be completed by the time the doc airs on HBO in January.

With so much attention on The West Memphis Three this week, it will be interesting to see if Egoyan's picture is one that audiences turn out for and critics endorse. He threatened a mainstream comeback with 2009's sexually-charged drama, "Chloe," starring Julianne Moore, Amanda Seyfried and Liam Neeson which was touted as his most accessible work to date, but critics savaged the picture and the film came and went without notice. Fiercely independent and uncompromising, Egoyan was on the precipice of a big Hollywood career after his sexual obsession drama, "Exotica" was released to critical acclaim. He was then offered a studio thriller called "Dead Sleep," but famously walked away from the project when he wasn't allowed to cast Susan Sarandon in the lead (Warner Bros. wanted a younger, sexier starlet instead). Tinseltown kicked themselves when 1997's "The Sweet Hereafter" earned two coveted Oscar nominations (Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay) and three awards at the Cannes Film Festival (including the Grand Jury Prize). But Egoyan never fulfilled the promise of becoming a well-known director and followed up 'Hereafter' with the little-seen "Felicia's Journey," and continued on an esoteric path of filmmaking that left him squarely in the quarters of the arthouse shadows. Ever since his work has been as far away as possible from commercial filmmaking, even though name brand actors like Kevin Bacon and Alison Lohman appeared in 2005's "Where the Truth Lies" and the aforementioned actors starred in "Chloe."

[MacGuffin]

Director Atom Egoyan Reveals Details of His Movie About the West Memphis Three (Exclusive)
"These three young men could not have done the crime. But the onus is not on our film anymore to have to prove that," says the director of the upcoming 'Devil's Knot.'
Source: THR

Even before the news broke Friday that the three men known as the West Memphis Three were being released after 18 years in prison, director Atom Egoyan was already at work on a feature film about the case based on Mara Leveritt's non-fiction book Devil's Knot: The True Story of the West Memphis Three. The project had originally been developed at Dimension Films, and when it was put into turnaround, producer Richard Saperstein, former Dimension president, took it over. Scott Derrickson and Paul Boardman, who wrote The Exorcism of Emily Rose, have written a screenplay, which Boardman has been reworking with Egoyan, who boarded the project, about two months ago.

The plan is to begin shooting a $20 million independent production in the spring, with Elizabeth Fowler and Clark Peterson producing along with Saperstein and Boardman. The Canadian-based Egoyan –best known for 1997's The Sweet Hereafter, for which he earned writing and directing Oscar nominations –is a big admirer of Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky's Paradise Lost documentaries, which exposed how three teens, accused of taking part in Satanic rituals, were unjustly convicted for the murders of three eight-year old boys in West Memphis, Ark. in 1993. But he's also convinced there's another story –about the "human drama behind it" –waiting to be told. Speaking by phone from Amsterdam, the director talked about his reaction to the latest developments in the case, the questions still unanswered and how the men's release could affect his film.

The Hollywood Reporter: What was your immediate reaction to yesterday's news?

Egoyan: Very exciting news, obviously, quite shocking and sadly predictable.

THR: Why did you become involved with Devil's Knot?

Egoyan: My longtime agent at WME, Robert Newman, suggested to producer Richard Saperstein that this was material that I might respond to. He was right. The screenplay beautifully examines the ebb and flow of grief, disbelief and anger that flowed through the community in the wake of this catastrophe. I responded to the emotional detail of the script, and its extraordinary dramatic possibilities. I am attracted to stories that examine the way we perceive reality, and the consequences of seeking truth and justice in extreme situations. And it's an amazing story of a community and the conflicting emotional needs of seeking and finding justice, but also the complexities of jumping to conclusions. In this case, it was very clear to me that there was a miscarriage of justice. But more interesting to me were just the emotional human elements of the characters. It's against the backdrop of this horrifying crime and this really unfortunate miscarriage that we all witnessed. I think the documentaries have done a really amazing job of showing that. But there's a human drama behind it all as well. I think this script has been able to capture that. Drawing from the book, there's a whole other narrative that I think presents itself, and that's what really got me excited. Against this almost mythological story, it's a contemporary Salem witchhunt. Of course, we've seen that story told before, but I think there's also the story of other characters who were peripherally connected to this, whose lives have been changed as well.

THR: The story is now an 18-year saga. What are you going to focus on?

Egoyan: The script is focusing on the events around the time of the first trial. Our concentration is on this process of a rush to justice, this idea of trying to make sense of something that is just so abhorrent, the most extreme, evil crime imaginable. I think about what the community must have gone through when its children were found murdered this way, and then to find three of its other sons guilty of the crime, it's a cataclysmic event for this community. The script examines some of the members of the community who were affected by this. I don't want to go into the details yet, but we're seeing it all against the backdrop of the trial itself. We're certainly seeing the lives of the three victims and aspects of the accused's lives. We're seeing all of that, but it's the backdrop to this other story that is also running concurrent to all these horrifying events.

THR: So the three teenagers who were convicted aren't necessarily the protagonists of the movie?

Egoyan: Not the boys, but others in community. I think what we're trying to do is create something of an ensemble drama here, looking at all these characters and looking at how the events ripple through the lives of a number of different characters. THR: Now that the three men have been released, will you have to make changes in the screenplay? Egoyan: We're going to have to absorb that. Unquestionably, it will have an effect on the way the movie is seen. What I think is clear from the book is that these three young men could not have done the crime. But the onus is not on our film anymore to have to prove that, which is good for the drama. It allows us to actually do what our cript sets out to do, which is to look at the larger dimension of what actually happened.

THR: Have you yourself talked to any participants in the case?

Egoyan: We're finishing the new draft, and there are conversations that we're hoping to have. We couldn't have secured the life rights of the three young men, because they were in prison and by law they couldn't sell their rights. But the rights have been secured for all the other people in that community. Not to mention the book itself and the transcripts to the trial as well. We're really looking at the questions that are set up in terms of the drama of the piece and the characters that we're following. The script is in really good shape as it is. There are certain things that we are now really refining. We now have to look at the new circumstances, but it's really not going to change anything, except maybe the titles that roll at the end. In the script that we have, nothing had been resolved and questions were still up in the air. Now we have answers to one part of the story. But there's a whole other element that's still open: Who did this, who's capable of this horrifying crime?

THR: Who are you thinking of casting?

Egoyan: We have some really rich roles, and so I don't think that will be challenging. What we're really trying to do now is strengthen those roles, make them as complex as they can be. We're looking at a spring shoot, so our focus now is to get the script in as good a shape as it can be. We should be ready to send it out early in the fall. THR: You mentioned the Paradise Lost documentaries. What role do you think they've played in keeping this case in the public eye? Egoyan: I think the documentaries have done an amazing job. The only other documentary like that I can think of is Errol Morris' The Thin Blue Line. What's exciting is that they are modifying the third installment because of the news that's come out. I think that must be incredibly gratifying for those filmmakers. It's clear how powerful the media can be when people are committed to telling a story.

THR: In your own case, do you see a connection between Devil's Knot and any of your earlier work?

Egoyan: This story is not dissimilar to The Sweet Hereafter, [which looked at how a fatal bus crash affected a small town]. There's this terrible tragedy, and people looking to make sense of it. How could this happen? The Sweet Hereafter had a clear perpetrator that actually concentrated the energy in a very different way. What's haunting about this story is that the perpetrator is still free. Does the case now get reopened? There are a number of possible avenues to pursue. What's wonderful is that these young men are free. What's terrible is that justice has not been done for the three young victims. It is the most horrific crime imaginable. When you look at the crime scene, when you look at the circumstances around it, it is unspeakably terrible. That has to take a toll on the minds of the victims' families.

I'm really interested in this question of how a sense of truth is arrived at, and what the process is for people seeking justice at a persona level, at a communal level, at a social level. Such a distorted sense of reality was presented to this jury. It's quite jaw dropping really when you look at the legal process. The travesties were not really addressed in terms of process itself. We can't do everything with this film, but I think we can touch on that as well, to understand when a situation is as extreme as this, and when there's such a need for closure, how compromised our search for justice can be. I am trying to feel a sense of compassion for why characters behave that way –while also considering the consequences.

[MacGuffin]

'The Killing's Mireille Enos Tied To 'Devil's Knot'
BY MIKE FLEMING | Deadline

EXCLUSIVE: The Killing star Mireille Enos has joined Reese Witherspoon and Colin Firth in Devil's Knot, the Atom Egoyan-directed drama about the West Memphis 3. Enos will play Vicki Hutcheson, the mother of an 8-year-old boy who lives in a run-down house in West Memphis. She becomes an important witness in the murder trial of Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley for the killing of three 8-year-old boys found hog-tied in a drainage ditch. Hutcheson, it becomes apparent to investigators, could be the only link between Echols and Misskelley.

As Deadline revealed just after the West Memphis 3 murder defendants were released from prison last summer, The Sweet Hereafter and Chloe director Egoyan came aboard to direct a script that was originally written by Scott Derrickson and Paul Boardman, the team behind The Exorcism Of Emily Rose.

Firth will play Ron Lax, a private investigator who was the first pro bono supporter of the defendants as they headed to trial in 1993. Lax built one of the most prominent private investigative firms in the Southeast, and offered his services for free to the defendants, who at the time were reviled because of the heinous nature of the crime and the sensationalized reports about devil worship and ritualistic sacrifice. All of that was later proven to be unfounded, after the West Memphis 3 were convicted despite a total absence of physical evidence. Witherspoon is playing Pam Hobbs, the mother of Steven Branch, one of the victims. She initially believed the trio murdered her son and the other two boys but became persuaded they were wrongly accused. An upcoming documentary casts suspicion on her ex-husband Terry Hobbs, who was Steven Branch's stepfather and who has denied any wrongdoing.

The script is based on investigative reporter Mara Leveritt's 2003 book Devil's Knot: The True Story of the West Memphis Three, an in-depth chronicle of the sensationalized trials. Elizabeth Fowler, Richard Saperstein, Clark Peterson, Christopher Woodrow and Paul Boardman are producing.

Enos was nominated for a Golden Globe and Emmy for her role as detective Sarah Linden in AMC's 'The Killing." She next stars with Josh Brolin, Sean Penn and Ryan Gosling in Gangster Squad, which Warner Bros releases September 7, and alongside Brad Pitt in World War Z, which gets released next summer. She's repped by CAA and Gartner/Green Entertainment.

[wilder]

I know some of you here swear by The Sweet Hereafter... I've only seen Exotica, Where the Truth Lies, and Chloe - his earlier movies somehow passed me by. Excited to dive into them, especially The Adjuster.

[jenkins]

The Adjuster is a perfectly weird movie, not to say it's perfect but to say it is weird, yet if you reach further back you'll learn that it's actually Egoyan becoming normal. he begins in the outer limits of experimental filmmaking. just to hype that stuff

[wilder]

Hyped.

[WorldForgot]

Lmk if yall disagree but, after the early work, The Adjuster almost felt like such an assured domestic irrealism/surrealism, that it moves like an homage to 80s alt-staples.

Spoiler: ShowHide

It reminds me of the Talking Heads, in poetry and anxiety, and uses some of Cronenberg's finest. Spoils of abundance.

[jenkins]

don't disagree

[polkablues]

The Adjuster's really good; very austere and surreal, like David Lynch on Valium. But Sweet Hereafter and Exotica are Egoyan's masterworks, for sure.