HOT PROPERTY FILMS ANNOUNCES TWO NEW SCI-FI PRODUCTIONS – DOGFIGHT AND PIPER FOLLOWING THE US RELEASE OF THEIR SCI-FI IDENTICALS THROUGH SAMUEL GOLDWYN FILMS AND NEW UK DISTRIBUTION DEAL WITH ARROW FILMS
London, UK: Tuesday 19th April, 2016 – Hot Property Films is thrilled to announce their upcoming slate of two Science Fiction productions DOGFIGHT and PIPER following the recent US theatrical release of their Sci-Fi IDENTICALS in US theatres, distributed by Samuel Goldwyn Films. Arrow Films have picked up IDENTICALS for the UK and will be releasing later this year after featuring in SciFi London International Film Festival on 3rd and 6th May. International sales are handled by The Match Factory.
Producer Janine Marmot is currently developing two science fiction films with BAFTA winning writer/ director Simon Pummell through their company Hot Property Films. DOGFIGHT is an adaption of the William Gibson and Michael Swanwick story of the same name. It follows Deke, a ‘proleboy’ fighter, as he struggles to make good in a future world of illegal ‘simulated sensorium’ boxing and holographic gaming. And PIPER, a story set in an abandoned space station, which explores what happens when Artificial Intelligence creates new links between human and animal.
Janine Marmot is also developing Ned Beauman’s THE PRICE ON YOUR HEAD, feature documentary FEAR OF THE UNKNOWN with Michael Whyte (LOOKING FOR LIGHT, NO GREATER LOVE), in addition to fiction and documentary projects with Grant Gee (INNOCENCE OF MEMORIES, JOY DIVISION).
IDENTICALS is a psychological thriller, a film stripped down and re-arranged into the looping logic of a nightmare. Imagine discovering you’re not unique, other versions of yourself – IDENTICALS – are hunting you down and only the strongest will survive. IDENTICALS is a film about a man – Slater – who must kill his old selves to create himself anew and his search for Nadia, the woman he loves.
IDENTICALS is a UK-Irish–Netherlands co-production, written and directed by Simon Pummell (SHOCK HEAD SOUL, BODYSONG) and produced by Janine Marmot (INNOCENCE OF MEMORIES, BODYSONG). It stars** Lachlan Nieboer** (SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF, CROSS OF HONOUR) and Nora-Jane Noone (BROOKLYN, THE DESCENT) Nick Blood (AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D.) and Peter Greenaway’s regular collaborator Reinier van Brummelen is the Director of Photography.
IDENTICALS is produced by Janine Marmot (Hot Property Films) in co-production with Conor Barry and John Keville (SP Film) and Reinier Selen (Rinkel Film) in association with Keith Griffiths’ Illuminations Films (BERBERIAN SOUND STUDIO, UNCLE BOONMEE) and Amy Gardner’s Finite Films. The film is financed by the BFI Film Fund, the Irish Film Board, the Netherlands Film Fund and Finite Films.
IDENTICALS is Simon Pummell’s first narrative feature film. He is best known for directing the BAFTA-winning documentary feature film BODYSONG (2003) that Time magazine described as “an utterly mesmerizing and humbling portrait of humanity.” It was the first film to be scored by Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead and in 2010 was re-released as a British Film Institute Collectors Edition DVD and book.
Simon’s second feature documentary SHOCK HEAD SOUL premiered in the Orizzonti Competition at the Venice Film Festival in 2011. The partner suite of animation films The Sputnik Effect showed as installations in galleries in Rotterdam, Amsterdam, Melbourne and Antwerp. The project forms a portrait of Daniel Paul Schreber the 19th Century outsider artist who elaborated a steam-punk vision of a machine universe penetrated by networks of ‘nerve-rays’, with himself at the very centre as God’s chosen bride.
Earlier in his career he made numerous award-winning animated films for UK television exploring various interpenetrations of technology and bodies. More recently an on-going series of animation films Atlas For Animate Bodies showed as an installation at the Victoria & Albert Museum London in Sept 2013, and KASK Ghent in 2015
In 2007/9 he was a Harvard University Film Study Center Fellow. Since 2010 he is Research Professor and Director of the Media Design Program at the Piet Zwart Institute for Graduate Research and Study.
He is currently developing two new science-fiction feature-film screenplays with Hot Property Films: an adaptation of William Gibson’s DOGFIGHT and PIPER.
Janine Marmot said:
“I love science fiction, it allows us to explore today through the lens of tomorrow, in a genre that really connects with audiences and gives us the opportunity to create visually stunning worlds. I’m very excited about working with Simon on these new films.”
Simon Pummell said:
“I have been a William Gibson fan for as long as I have been a filmmaker. I’m really thrilled to have the chance to make a screen adaption of the Gibson and Swanwick story DOGFIGHT. The story is a beautiful glimpse into Gibson’s entire fictional world.”
