First you get the money, then you get the casting, then you start shooting…. but the folks behind Olivier Assayas‘ "Idols Eye" didn’t get that first part figured out.
Due to have been shooting by this point, Deadline reports that production on the gangster flick has been axed, with Benaroya Pictures shuttering the movie. Here’s what they said in a statement: Due to the criteria for financing not being met by producers, Benaroya Pictures has formally decided to discontinue financing the motion picture titled IDOL’S EYE. The company cannot continue to put its investment at risk and has been forced to stop cash flowing the production. This is something all of us wanted to avoid, but due to the producers missing a number of financing criteria deadlines that were mutually established by all parties, we were left with no other options. Benaroya Pictures plans to retain the rights of the film and move forward with production on the picture after we generate a revised script and assemble a new filmmaking team.
And it’s disappointment, because this picture was promising. Robert Pattinson, Robert De Niro and Rachel Weisz were slated to star in the French auteur’s film, based on a 2007 Playboy article called "Boosting The Big Tuna" by Hillel Levin about a bunch of regular criminals who accidentally rob a porn store backed by Chicago mafia boss Tony Accardo.
Perhaps someone can step in and save the movie with financing, but even if so, these are all actors with busy schedules, so it remains to be seen if this movie will be made with this particular cast involved. A disappointment to be sure, particularly as it would’ve marked a pretty fascinating gear change by Assayas, but it seems we can’t have nice things when it comes to this project.