Ashley Hillard
The always-dependable Andy Garcia, currently hamming it up (and suitably so) in “The Pink Panther 2”, tells Moviehole he’s attached to a sequel to Jack Nicholson classic “The Last Detail”. But as anyone whose ever tried to independently produce a film – or a studio film for that matter – knows, an attachment only means something to an investor with a deep pocket. And in this case, they’ve yet to find anyone willing to throw cash at the film. Yes, you heard right – a movie with Andy Garcia in it’s cast isn’t enough to entice Hollywood’s financially well-off to the party, shit hey!? Just shows you how darn hard it is to get a movie up, right!?..
But you’ll scratch your head even more (maybe until the cranium bleeds) when I tell you this – Jack Nicholson, Morgan Freeman, Bruce Willis, Robert Duvall and Laurence Fishburne have also agreed to do the movie! Three of the biggest names in film there, and yet nobody wants to bankroll the flick!? WTF!? It’s such absolutely amazing that such a line-up can’t attract any kind of interest.
”It’s a movie that Todd Robinson wrote, but it has not been financed” Garcia tells us. ”He’s asked me to participate in it, and I told him I would, but it’s not been done yet.”
“The Last Full Measure”, as the film is titled, is written and intended to be directed, as Garcia says, by Todd Robinson. And maybe that’s where the problem lies – Robinson. He’s an accomplished enough writer – well, maybe accomplished is too strong a word; he’s got a lot of credits anyway – but is he the nail in the coffin of the finance talks? Robinson recently wrote a sequel to Kathryn Bigelow’s “Point Break”, set to shoot next month in Bali, and recently wrote (and directed) forgettable Travolta-Gandolfini crime-thriller “Lonely Hearts”. He’s also worked on TV series (like “The Outsiders” and “The Young Riders”) and a few westerns (nothing you’d have heard of). But he hasn’t really done anything ‘big’, let alone successful – and maybe investors are a little worried he can’t handle an all-star blockbuster like “Last Measure”? If he wasn’t on board, and say, for example, Rob Reiner, Ron Howard or Clint Eastwood was, would it make a difference? I’d say it would. Probably doesn’t help that Robinson’s biggest film, as director, was the little-seen “Lonely Hearts” – not a bad movie, but did jack nothing. Sure not to have many money-men seeing dollar signs when they shake his hand.
I actually dropped an email to someone sorta-connected to the project who shed a little light on the status of the project. He tells me that “the money was there, but the deal fell through at the last minute” and that “it was supposed to happen a while back, but got pulled – dunno if it will ever get done?” My source couldn’t say why the pin was pulled – and whether or not it had anything to do with the no-name director – just that it collapsed.
“The Last Full Measure”, a belated sequel to “The Last Detail”, is a pretty serious-sounding flick :
An ambitious government bureaucrat is given an unwelcome assignment that could harm his carefully orchestrated career, to complete a long-unfinished report on whether the nation’s highest award for bravery should, after 40 years, be given to a fallen hero. Still, could go down well with the Oscar voting committee… hey, maybe they can finance it!?
