Alcon Entertainment announced Thrusday it will finance and produce the supernatural thriller “Beautiful Creatures,” based on the New York Times best selling novel of the same name--the first in the popular series written by authors Kami Carcia and Margaret Stohl.
The announcement, made by Alcon co-founders and co-CEOs Broderick Johnson and Andrew Kosove, also noted that two-time Academy Award nominee Viola Davis, most recently nominated for her leading role in “The Help,” is in negotiations for a key role.
The film will be released by Warner Bros via Alcon’s output deal.
Alcon, which has film rights to all three books in the series published by Little Brown Books--including "Beautiful Darkness" and "Beautiful Chaos"--is looking at “Creatures” to kick off a possible franchise at WB.
Richard LaGravenese will direct from his own adaptation of the novel. Erwin Stoff (“The Matrix,” “I Am Legend”) will produce along with Kosove and Johnson (“The Blind Side, “The Book of Eli”), and Molly Smith (“Something Borrowed,” “P.S. I Love You”).
LaGravenese, director of Alcon’s “P.S. I Love You,” “Freedom Writers,” among others, is the screenwriter of such features as “Water for Elephants,” “The Bridges of Madison County,” and “The Fisher King,” for which he received an Oscar nomination for original screenplay. LaGravenese’s screenplay is an adaptation of the first of the three books in this best-selling franchise that has been translated into 30 languages worldwide.
A coming of age story set in the South, “Beautiful Creatures” is about two star-crossed teenage lovers, Ethan, a local boy, and a mysterious new girl, Lena, who uncover dark secrets about their families, their history and their town.
Davis will play Amma, a seer who looks after Ethan and his father after Ethan’s mother’s death.
"The movies that always excite me, pull back a curtain and show an exotic and imaginative world behind the familiar world that we know…And thus make us see our world differently when we leave the theater," Stoff said. "This story successfully uses the bucolic, peaceful world of the Gothic South and the stories of families that have been rooted there for generations to tell a story of fated love… A mythic struggle between good and evil… And how each generation has the power to claim its own destiny. Our intention is to create characters that are so rich, and a world that is so inviting, that audiences will desire to have the story continue beyond this movie."
“This is such a richly atmospheric story, full of magic and supernatural twists," Kosove and Johnson said. "Readers have been responding to these books in a way that bodes well for a new franchise success, and we’re delighted to be working with Richard, Erwin, Molly and the divine Viola Davis on this exciting project."
Also joining the production are Oscar-winning cinematographer Philippe Rousselot (“Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows”, “Big Fish”, “Charlie & the Chocolate Factory”), Oscar-nominated costume designer Jeffrey Kurland (“Inception”, “Ocean’s Eleven”, “Erin Brockovich”), and production designer Richard Sherman (“The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn- Part 1 &2”).
Filming will begin in April in and around New Orleans.
Alcon recently produced the hit “Dolphin Tale,” a 3-D family film starring Morgan Freeman, Harry Connick Jr., Ashley Judd and Kris Kristofferson.
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| The series includes three novels. |
The film will be released by Warner Bros via Alcon’s output deal.
Alcon, which has film rights to all three books in the series published by Little Brown Books--including "Beautiful Darkness" and "Beautiful Chaos"--is looking at “Creatures” to kick off a possible franchise at WB.
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| Viola Davis |
LaGravenese, director of Alcon’s “P.S. I Love You,” “Freedom Writers,” among others, is the screenwriter of such features as “Water for Elephants,” “The Bridges of Madison County,” and “The Fisher King,” for which he received an Oscar nomination for original screenplay. LaGravenese’s screenplay is an adaptation of the first of the three books in this best-selling franchise that has been translated into 30 languages worldwide.
A coming of age story set in the South, “Beautiful Creatures” is about two star-crossed teenage lovers, Ethan, a local boy, and a mysterious new girl, Lena, who uncover dark secrets about their families, their history and their town.
Davis will play Amma, a seer who looks after Ethan and his father after Ethan’s mother’s death.
"The movies that always excite me, pull back a curtain and show an exotic and imaginative world behind the familiar world that we know…And thus make us see our world differently when we leave the theater," Stoff said. "This story successfully uses the bucolic, peaceful world of the Gothic South and the stories of families that have been rooted there for generations to tell a story of fated love… A mythic struggle between good and evil… And how each generation has the power to claim its own destiny. Our intention is to create characters that are so rich, and a world that is so inviting, that audiences will desire to have the story continue beyond this movie."
“This is such a richly atmospheric story, full of magic and supernatural twists," Kosove and Johnson said. "Readers have been responding to these books in a way that bodes well for a new franchise success, and we’re delighted to be working with Richard, Erwin, Molly and the divine Viola Davis on this exciting project."
Also joining the production are Oscar-winning cinematographer Philippe Rousselot (“Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows”, “Big Fish”, “Charlie & the Chocolate Factory”), Oscar-nominated costume designer Jeffrey Kurland (“Inception”, “Ocean’s Eleven”, “Erin Brockovich”), and production designer Richard Sherman (“The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn- Part 1 &2”).
Filming will begin in April in and around New Orleans.
Alcon recently produced the hit “Dolphin Tale,” a 3-D family film starring Morgan Freeman, Harry Connick Jr., Ashley Judd and Kris Kristofferson.
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