Summit Entertainment and OddLot Entertainment announced today that production has begun on director Ivan Reitman’s sports dramedy Draft Day.  The film takes place within the span of one day, the day of the NFL Draft, as Kevin Costner plays a general manger who has the opportunity to save football in Cleveland when he trades for the number one pick.  As the day’s events unfold, “he must quickly decide what he’s willing to sacrifice in pursuit of perfection as the lines between his personal and professional life become blurred on a life-changing day for a few hundred young men with dreams of playing in the NFL.”

Filming is underway in New York, where the production will shoot some scenes at the actual 2013 NFL Draft.  Once that is complete, filming will move to Cleveland.  The ensemble includes Jennifer Garner, Denis Leary, Ellen Burstyn, Frank Langella, Josh Pence, Rosanna Arquette, Timothy Simons and 42 star Chadwick Boseman, and the start-of-production press release notes that Terry Crews and Sean “P. Diddy” Combs have also joined the cast.  Hit the jump to read the full press release, which includes the entire cast listing.

[This is a re-post of my review from the 2012 Sundance Film Festival.  Compliance opens in limited release today.]

In recent memory, only last year’s Martha Marcy May Marlene made my skin crawl and stomach turn like Compliance. In some ways, Compliance is far worse since it goes beyond two people and instead casts an accusatory finger at humanity and asks, “How easily can you be tricked into dehumanizing another person?” Craig Zobel‘s incredible script and brilliant direction slowly puts you in a chokehold until you’re struggling to breathe and begging to be let go. Compliance is almost impossibly difficult to endure and it only eases up when Zobel makes a minor mistake in casting, explanation, or resolution. But these are small missteps in a film that sickens you to your core. And then it gets worse when you remember that the story is based on true events.

The trailer for Craig Zobel‘s Compliance has gone online.  The film, based on true events, revolves around the employees at a fast food restaurant who bend to the wills of a disembodied voice on the telephone claiming to be a police officer.  I saw the film at Sundance, and it made my skin crawl and stomach turn.  It’s a movie where you want to chastise the characters for being stupid, but deep down you’re forced to seriously consider if you would have behaved the same way in their position.  Zobel did a tremendous job creating a psychological thriller that gets into some interesting and unnerving questions about human psychology.  The trailer’s worth watching although it could have done a better job at highlighting the film’s creepiness.

Hit the jump to check out the trailer.  The film stars Ann Dowd, Dreama Walker, Pat Healy, and Bill Camp.  Compliance opens August 17th.

In recent memory, only last year’s Martha Marcy May Marlene made my skin crawl and stomach turn like Compliance.  In some ways, Compliance is far worse since it goes beyond two people and instead casts an accusatory finger at humanity and asks, “How easily can you be tricked into dehumanizing another person?”  Craig Zobel‘s incredible script and brilliant direction slowly puts you in a chokehold until you’re struggling to breathe and begging to be let go.  Compliance is almost impossibly difficult to endure and it only eases up when Zobel makes a minor mistake in casting, explanation, or resolution.  But these are small missteps in a film that sickens you to your core.  And then it gets worse when you remember that the story is based on true events.

Two years ago writer/director Ti West established himself as one of the premiere voices in American horror with the tantalizing satanic tease of The House Of The Devil. Now he returns with another slowburn horror tale in the haunted hotel flick The Innkeepers. His latest effort incorporates quirky humor into his methodically paced style with mixed results. West is adept at writing subtly comedic characters and building tension, but something about the combination of the two techniques feels awkward in this outing. Tension is often killed by the comedy and the delicate mundane world of the characters clashes with the film’s supernatural shenanigans at times. It’s an undeniably flawed effort, but still an unconventional spin on the genre from a uniquely personal filmmaker that deserves to be seen, even if lowered expectations apply. Collider got an early peak at the film last week at the Toronto After Dark Film Festival, so hit the jump for all the ghostly details.

Sara Paxton (Last House on the Left) will be joining the cast of Ti West’s (The House of the Devil) newest horror film The Innkeepers.  Paxton will be playing the lead in the film.  Pat Healy (The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford), Kelly McGillis (Top Gun) and George Riddle have also joined the cast.

In the film Paxton and Healy play the last two clerks in a hundred-year-old haunted hotel in the last days before its closure as a few final strange guests come to stay. The shoot is taking place at the Yankee Pedlar Inn, a real New England hotel long suspected of actually being haunted. (via THR)

The film will be produced by Derek Curl, Peter Phok, Larry Fessenden and Ti West at Dark Sky Films.  The film begins shooting this week in Connecticut.  There is no current release date.