Source: Dateline NY Author: Mike Fleming
Emmett/Furla Films has stepped up and committed to fully finance Motor City, the Albert Hughes-directed action film that stars Gerard Butler as a man who is double crossed, and seeks revenge on the guy who put him behind bars and took his woman. Gary Oldman is aboard to play the villain, and Amber Heard the woman. The film, which has a budget north of $40 million, is now set to begin production in September through EFF and Silver Pictures. Joel Silver and Andrew Rona are producing for Silver Pictures, while Randall Emmett and George Furla board as producers for EFF, along with their funding partners, Envision Entertainment’s Stepan Martirosyan and Remington Chase. Brandon Grimes is coproducer. Warner Bros will distribute domestically, while foreign rights will be sold at Cannes by Mark Damon and Foresight.
This adds another muscular title to a number of them that have been paid for by Emmett/Furla and Envision. Those films include 2 Guns with Denzel Washington, Mark Wahlberg and Paula Patton for Universal; the Peter Berg-directed Lone Survivor for Universal; the Sylvester Stallone-Arnold Schwarzenegger-starrer The Tomb for Lionsgate/Summit; the romantic comedy Rule #1, with Reese Witherspoon; the action/thriller Empire State starring Dwayne Johnson; and Lucky Strike, which is in discussions to star Vince Vaughn and be directed by Tony Scott, with EFF producing with Scott Free Productions. EFF recently wrapped the thriller Broken City with Wahlberg, Russell Crowe and Catherine Zeta-Jones, which Fox will release in January; the Stephen Frears-directed comedy Lay The Favorite with Bruce Willis, Rebecca Hall, Zeta-Jones and Vaughn, which The Weinstein Company acquired after its Sundance premiere; the thriller Frozen Ground with John Cusack, Nicolas Cage and Vanessa Hudgens, which EFF produced with Cheetah Vision; the drama Fire With Fire with Josh Duhamel, Willis and Rosario Dawson; the action-thriller Freelancers with Robert De Niro, Forest Whitaker and Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson; and the David Ayer-directed mystery crime thriller End Of Watch, which recently scored a $2 million advance and $20 million P&A commitment from Open Road. EFF and Envision just committed to finance the Joe and Anthony Russo-directed Ciudad.
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