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Preview by: Jack Foley
A QUIRKY romantic comedy, devised by and starring Scrubs star,
Zach Braff, was one of the toasts of this year’s Sundance
Film Festival when it emerged with not one, but TWO distributors.
In what is being described as an unprecedented acquisition deal,
both Fox Searchlight and Miramax have joined forces to release
the film, which co-stars Natalie Portman, Ian Holm and Peter Sarsgaard.
The film in question is Garden State, and tells the story of
Andrew Largeman (Braff), as he returns to his hometown, in New
Jersey, for the first time in 10 years, to attend his mother's
funeral, and quickly finds himself becoming reconnected with the
world he left behind.
While there, he meets a girl, Samantha (Portman), who may change
his life forever.
Andrew’s journey of self-rediscovery is made all the more
healthier when he stops taking the powerful anti-depressants he
had been prescribed for years, a move which helps him to confront
his psychologist father (Holm) as well as help Samantha through
her own psychological issues.
The film played at the Sundance Film Festival, in the dramatic
competition, and was widely praised for being ‘the kind of
quirky romantic comedy that used to be a staple of Hollywood’.
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Efilmcritic.com, for instance, wrote that it belongs on the short
list of modern films, like Beautiful Girls and Lost
in Translation, which engulf us in an invisible technique
known as storytelling excellence.
While the Sundance website, itself, wrote that, ‘without
overstating things, Garden State makes an excellent case for writer/director/actor
Zach Braff evolving into the Woody Allen of his time…
"Needless to say, Garden State is clever. But it's the honesty,
self-deprecation, and imagination of this study of a young man's
search for himself that place it above the pedestrian reach of
Braff's peers."
Needless to say, Fox Searchlight and Miramax are delighted to
have acquired the film and will share equally in the films world-wide
revenues.
Producer, Gary Gilbert, commented after the deal was struck:
"We are thrilled to be partnering with two of the best distributors
in the business... both of whom are clearly as passionate about
this film as we are."
And the sense of joy translates to the cast, itself, with Portman
announcing, in interview, that ‘it was so fun to work on,
because everyone was really there because they wanted to be working
on it, not for any other silly reasons that people sometimes use
to justify their film-making.
"It's really this weird romantic comedy type thing but very
strange. It's funny! I'm excited about it - I'm interested to
see how audiences react to it," she added.
Audiences will be given the opportunity to find out when the
movie is released in the UK later this year.
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