No Writers, No Movies? Strike May Hit '09 Films

While the writers' strike's effect on television is already being felt, it's harder to suss out the impact of picketing pencil-pushers on movie productions. Films tend to have a longer lead time; the writing of scripts usually comes early in the process.

So filmgoers fearing a famine in 2008 needn't be worried -- but what 2009 and 2010 will look like is anyone's guess if the strike drags on past the spring.

"A number of pictures are going forward," says Anne Thompson, deputy editor of Variety.com. "And there are a number of pictures waiting in the wings, ready to go, that will not go until the writers are ready to go back."

A number of films slated for production have been delayed, says LA Weekly columnist Nikki Finke, who's been covering the strike heavily on her online news site, Nikki Finke's Deadline Hollywood Daily. Not that studio suits are eager to talk about it. "Studios felt it was damaging them." No one, she says in an interview, wanted to look as if "they were hurting from the strike."

Oliver Stone's film about the 1968 My Lai massacre, "Pinkville," was shelved after sets were built and cast and crew were hired, according to Finke.

Also moved to the back burner are "Nine," the musical based on the Fellini film "8 1/2 "; "Angels & Demons," the second installment in the "Da Vinci Code" franchise; Michael Bay's "Transformers 2"; and 20th Century Fox's remake of the 1966 film "Fantastic Voyage."

Finke says the Washington-set thriller "State of Play" was a near casualty of the strike when Brad Pitt bailed from the project because he had problems with the script. The mid-November filming schedule was pushed back, yet casting seems the bigger factor. After Pitt, Edward Norton decamped, citing scheduling conflicts; Russell Crowe and Ben Affleck have since signed on, and "State of Play" is back in play.

Also affected were Mira Nair's "Shantaram," starring Johnny Depp as a heroin addict who reinvents himself as a doctor in the slums of Mumbai, and "Castlevania," a Dracula film based on the highly popular video game series of the same name.

"It's very frustrating for me," says Jeremy Bolt of Impact Pictures, who is producing "Castlevania" along with his business partner, writer Paul W.S. Anderson. "We had about four or five weeks of script work to do when the strike hit.

"The script is critical," says Bolt, who also produced the "Resident Evil" franchise. "We see this as potentially a huge franchise. It's too valuable to rush."

Ultimately, what film folks are really worried about right now is the specter of yet another possible strike: the Screen Actors Guild. Its contract expires in June.

"We are seeing a lot of people scrambling," says Matt Warren, vice president of production for Film Finances, a bonding company based in Los Angeles, which oversaw the funding for the now-shelved Oliver Stone film. "It's become difficult to sign an actor because everyone wants to make the best money deal before the actors strike. It's hard to make a deal with an actor when they're trying to land their biggest payday."