Motion Pictures
April 17, 2001
Academy Award-Winning Screenwriter Brian Helgeland Signed To Write Screenplay Based On Best-Selling Novel “Mystic River” For Clint Eastwood, Warner Bros. Pictures And Malpaso
(April 17, 2001 – Burbank, CA) – Academy Award-winning screenwriter Brian Helgeland will join forces with Academy Award-winning filmmaker Clint Eastwood on an upcoming feature based on the best-selling novel “Mystic River.” The creative collaboration was announced today by Lorenzo di Bonaventura, President of Worldwide Production, Warner Bros. Pictures.
“Mystic River,” a psychological suspense thriller written by Dennis Lehane, now in its ninth week in the top ten of the New York Times Bestseller list, was recently acquired by Warner Bros. Pictures and Malpaso Productions for Clint Eastwood to produce and direct. It tells the pensive and evocative story of three childhood friends whose relationship ends in the wake of a tragic incident. Twenty-five years later, the three are inexorably linked by a murder investigation.
Eastwood and Helgeland are currently collaborating on another project, based on the bestselling mystery thriller “Blood Work” by Michael Connelly, now in development at Warner Bros. Pictures. Eastwood is set to produce, star and direct from Helgeland’s screenplay.
Helgeland won an Oscar and received Golden Globe and BAFTA nominations for Best Screenplay, with Curtis Hanson, for the 1998 stylish noir crime drama “L.A. Confidendial.” He wrote and directed the 1999 thriller “Payback,” as well as the upcoming action adventure,“A Knight’s Tale.” Helgeland’s screenwriting credits include “Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master,” “Assassins,” “Conspiracy Theory” and “The Postman.”
An accomplished actor, producer and director, Clint Eastwood has established a long and successful history with Warner Bros. Pictures, including the recent hit film “Space Cowboys,” as well as the dramatic thrillers “True Crime” and “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil”; the romantic drama “The Bridges of Madison County”; and the Academy Award-winning western “Unforgiven,” which earned Best Picture and Best Director honors for Eastwood. # # #