Duvall considered marketing the story as a feature or one-day network TV movie before landing at AMC, which has never bought the notion that the western is dead, having stopped speaking to audiences more inclined to watch antiheroes than heroes and who find their escapist clashes between civilization and a lawless frontier in sci-fi tales set in space. Or maybe it was simply counterprogramming that led AMC to embrace westerns and John Wayne, licensing 32 of his films. In any case, the network was eager to back its first original project.Full article and video clip available at the link above.
"We were looking for a big event that would be our first big event," says AMC President Ed Carroll, who gave the go-ahead for shooting the two-part Broken Trail last summer in Alberta, Canada, with the confidence that Duvall would "lend immediate credibility" to the debut effort but also understanding that AMC was getting "a perfectionist … who has a strong point of view."
Translation: This star-producer would not sit quietly by if a network suit decided that TV required a happier ending, say, than he believed appropriate.
Duvall is not generally a believer in those. The 90-year-old Foote recalls the one line in Tender Mercies for which the actor, in character, allowed himself tears. It goes, "I don't trust happiness. Never did. Never will."
So that was one issue, how much happily-ever-after. Also how much gunplay. "You gotta have a shootout in a western, I suppose," Duvall says, but "you can't overdo that. They weren't such deadeye shots, those guys."
Check out the rest of the article at this link."Using different venues for their annual VIP ceremonies, this year's red carpet was laid in front of the Metro Cinema downtown and, unlike other events where carpets are placed symbolically, this one was truly star-studded. Even though its specifically an aboriginal film celebration, the actors who arrived are recognizable on a national and even international level - like Dakota House and one of last year's inductees, Jimmy Herman, whose credits include Dances With Wolves and Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven.
The large lounge was filled with patrons in colourful evening gowns, black tuxedos and other creative ensembles like the top hat and purple velvet coat worn by award-winning Mohican composer Brent Michael Davids, who created a beautiful score for the 1920 silent film The Last of the Mohicans screened this year.
Board members and organizers recognized all areas of the film industry including APTN (Aboriginal Peoples Television Network) and the National Film Board of Canada for their contributions to the success of the artists and industry.
This year, five astounding individuals were chosen to lay their hands in concrete and formally be inducted into the Walk of Honour including Tantoo Cardinal, one of the most renowned and recognized aboriginal actors in the world."
On Monday, June 12, the Banff World Television Festival 2006 announced the winners for the 27th Annual Banff World Television Awards.The official story is located at the Calgary Sun website.Shatner, 75, will play a journalist following the attempt by Laurie Skreslet and Pat Morrow to become the first Canadians to scale the highest mountain peak on Earth.
Everest 82 is a co-production of Ontario’s Screen Door Productions and Calgary’s Alberta Filmworks Inc.
The four-hour, two-part TV film which began shooting in Banff, Jasper and Kananaskis in April is set to wrap June 19.
Edmonton-born Eric Johnson stars as Skreslet.
Jason Priestley is currently in town shooting a cameo as John Laughlin, a climber who helped organize the expedition, but was killed in an Alberta climb months before it began.
