The Post | Ensemble Cast with Tom Hanks & Meryl Streep | Spielberg | Pentagon Papers Film....Dec 22 2017 | Trailer on p.11

[franfar]

http://deadline.com/2017/03/steven-spielberg-tom-hanks-meryl-streep-pentagon-papers-the-post-amy-pascal-1202034193/

 

Quote

EXCLUSIVE: A timely film about the vital role of the press in keeping government honest is coming together with a powerhouse cast. Steven Spielberg just said yes to direct Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep in The Post, the spec script by Liz Hannah bought last fall by Amy Pascal’s Pascal Pictures. The deals are being negotiated. The film is a drama about the Washington Post’s role in exposing the Pentagon Papers in 1971, and how the Post’s editor Ben Bradlee and publisher Kay Graham challenged the federal government over their right to publish them.

 

The film will be co-financed by Fox and Amblin Entertainment. Fox will handle domestic distribution; international will be Amblin, through its output deals with Universal, eOne, Reliance and others. With the Fox deal, Spielberg reunites with chairman/CEO Stacey Snider, his longtime partner at DreamWorks. This marks the fifth pairing of Spielberg with Hanks, after Saving Private Ryan, Catch Me If you Can, The Terminal and Bridge of Spies. Streep voiced the blue fairy for Spielberg in A.I., and she is narrating the Netflix documentary Five Came Back. Spielberg is exec producing that film, and he also is one of the interview subjects in the film about WWII’s impact on cinema.

Pascal will produce with Spielberg, and Kristie Macosko Krieger (Bridge of Spies). Rachel O’Connor will be executive producer along with Star Thrower Entertainment’s Tim and Trevor White, and Adam Somner. They’ll fit this into Spielberg’s busy schedule soonest. Among others, he has been casting The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara, which will star Mark Rylance and Oscar Isaac. Spielberg is in post-production on Ready Player One.

The idea is for Sully star Hanks to play Bradlee, the editor who would figure in the movie classic All The President’s Men. Streep, coming off an Oscar nom for Florence Foster Jenkins, would play Graham.

In an age where rampant web leaks of emails has left it difficult to figure out whether they are fair game or privacy invasion, the Pentagon Papers is the whistle blower equivalent of WWII, in how soldiers felt they were on the side of the angels fighting it. The classified study about the Vietnam War was commissioned by the Defense Department and revealed unreported facts about a secret dramatic escalation of troops and bombings in what was appearing to be an unwinnable war.

Military analyst Daniel Ellsberg, pro-war when he started working on the study at the RAND Corporation, became convinced it should be absorbed to set future policy, and leaked the classified information to the New York Times. That paper published a scathing first installment that charged the Johnson administration had systematically lied to the public and to Congress about Vietnam.

When the incumbent Nixon administration Attorney General John Mitchell and Nixon failed to get the paper to stop, they got a federal court injunction forcing the Times to cease after three installments. The Washington Post grabbed the baton (Ellsberg gave the study to Bradlee) and published more revelations from the 47-volume study. Other papers including the Boston Globe jumped in, and Alaska U.S. Senator Mike Gravel read highlights aloud in a Senate subcommittee hearing. The floodgates had opened, and together the New York Times and Washington Post appealed to the Supreme Court on First Amendment grounds. The justices ruled 6-3 that the government failed to prove a harm to national security and that publication was justified by the First Amendment.

Ellsberg was arrested and charged with conspiracy, espionage and theft of government property. While Ellsberg said he was willing to go to jail to stop an unjust war, charges against him were eventually dropped when the Watergate scandal revealed that staffers at the Nixon White House were involved in unlawful efforts to discredit him by burglarizing the office of his psychiatrist.

CAA reps Spielberg, Hanks and Streep and is helping to put all this together.

 

EDIT (6/6/2017): http://variety.com/2017/film/news/steven-spielberg-pentagon-papers-movie-sarah-paulson-bob-odenkirk-ma]tthew-rhys-1202454085/

 

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Sarah Paulson, Bob Odenkirk, Matthew Rhys, Bradley Whitford, Carrie Coon, Jesse Plemons, David Cross, Alison Brie, Bruce Greenwood, Tracy Letts, Michael Stuhlbarg, and Zach Woods have joined the ensemble of Steven Spielberg’s “The Papers,” which already stars Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep. The film centers on the Washington Post’s decision to publish the classified Pentagon Papers in 1971.

 

Formerly known as “The Post,” the movie is a co-production between Amblin Entertainment and Fox. The film has been fast-tracked with the hope of making this year’s awards season race, with production already underway.

 

The movie will see a limited release on Dec. 22 and go wide on Jan. 12, 2018.

 

[aabattery]

If it's even half as good as All the President's Men, this should be a great movie.

[CoolioD1]

they're calling it "timely" but looking at berg's schedule they're not getting this out before 2020 at the earliest unless something falls through.

[That One Girl]

Sold on Spielberg.  

[Harley]

Wow. Someone is casting is going to get a raise.

[Mikasa Ackerman]

Spielberg + Hanks is a provably diminishing box office power:

 

$481m WW - Saving Private Ryan

$352m WW - Catch Me If You Can

$219m WW - The Terminal

$165m WW - Bridge Of Spies

 

Not sure Streep has the power to stop the slide.

[franfar]

2 hours ago, CoolioD1 said:

they're calling it "timely" but looking at berg's schedule they're not getting this out before 2020 at the earliest unless something falls through.

You-know-who will still likely be in power by then, so I could see it being relevant by then.

[franfar]

49 minutes ago, Mikasa Ackerman said:

Spielberg + Hanks is a provably diminishing box office power:

 

$481m WW - Saving Private Ryan

$352m WW - Catch Me If You Can

$219m WW - The Terminal

$165m WW - Bridge Of Spies

 

Not sure Streep has the power to stop the slide.

His movies don't have the same eye popping returns as they used to, but they still garner decent returns, critical and BO. 

 

Non-Spielberg movies of those subject matters would kill for those numbers. He's still solid.

[Mikasa Ackerman]

14 minutes ago, franfar said:

Non-Spielberg movies of those subject matters would kill for those numbers.

 

I don't doubt that, doesn't change the trend though. With this combo and subject matter, I'd put the ceiling of this at 150m WW.

[filmlover]

Kinda boggles the mind that Streep hasn't worked with Spielberg until now, voice cameo in AI aside.

[franfar]

3 minutes ago, filmlover said:

Kinda boggles the mind that Streep hasn't worked with Spielberg until now, voice cameo in AI aside.

I'm not sure if their styles really align

 

When I see a Meryl Streep film, she is the center of attention

 

When I see a Speilberg film.... it feels like it's more of the story and background that is key. Although, I haven't seen a film from either of them in ages, so I might be wrong.

[Jonwo]

I'm guessing It's What I Do isn't going to be directed by Spielberg anymore. He's got a packed schedule for the next three years alone, 

[WrathOfHan]

This is being fast tracked for this year   

 

http://deadline.com/2017/03/steven-spielberg-tom-hanks-meryl-streep-pentagon-papers-oscar-race-the-post-1202040913/

 

@Telemachos can we get this moved to the main forum?

[franfar]

Just now, WrathOfHan said:

This is being fast tracked for this year   

 

http://deadline.com/2017/03/steven-spielberg-tom-hanks-meryl-streep-pentagon-papers-oscar-race-the-post-1202040913/

 

@Telemachos can we get this moved to the main forum?

Life comes at you fast

[aabattery]

Wow. They're thirsty for an Oscar I guess.

[That One Girl]

15 minutes ago, WrathOfHan said:

This is being fast tracked for this year   

 

http://deadline.com/2017/03/steven-spielberg-tom-hanks-meryl-streep-pentagon-papers-oscar-race-the-post-1202040913/

 

@Telemachos can we get this moved to the main forum?

 

Have they even started production?  Do they even have a script?  Rushing a movie out in 9 months is not gonna end well.

[That One Girl]

Like if they start filming in May then let's say they film until August, then they have 4 months at the most to edit it and that's assuming they didn't rush at all (which they obviously are).  Streep will probably get a nomination but it's not hard to imagine it being this year's Silence (complete Oscar shutout aside from one category) with worse reception.

[CoolioD1]

2 minutes ago, That One Guy said:

 

Have they even started production?  Do they even have a script?  Rushing a movie out in 9 months is not gonna end well.

there's a script. it was on the blacklist so i've read it. it's pretty good. pretty much what you'd expect. it's just people talking in like, 6 different rooms through the whole movie how hard can it be to put together before december.

[That One Girl]

1 minute ago, CoolioD1 said:

there's a script. it was on the blacklist so i've read it. it's pretty good. pretty much what you'd expect. it's just people talking in like, 6 different rooms through the whole movie how hard can it be to put together before december.

 

Okay, a bit relieving.  Hopefully it won't be a shitshow though since a 7 month production/post-production schedule does sound very hectic.

[CoolioD1]

1 minute ago, That One Guy said:

Like if they start filming in May then let's say they film until August, then they have 4 months at the most to edit it and that's assuming they didn't rush at all (which they obviously are).  Streep will probably get a nomination but it's not hard to imagine it being this year's Silence (complete Oscar shutout aside from one category) with worse reception.

lol they're not gonna spend 3 months shooting probably only one. Munich was made in that time frame. schindler's list as well.

Edited March 11, 2017 by CoolioD1