Corman to cameo in Dante’s biopic

Corman is the founder of New World Pictures and the man behind such cult classics as The Masque Of The Red Death (1989), Little Shop of Horrors (1960) and Death Race 2000 (1975).

The Man With Kaleidoscope Eyes will be produced by Said Ben Said of SBS Productions.

Set in Hollywood in the late 1960s, the film is billed as a comedy. Corman is to make a cameo as himself and has given the project his full blessing.

SBS is likely to handle sales as well as to produce the film, which will be financed through European sources.

Also new from SBS is Brian De Palma’s loose adaptation of Emile Zola’s Therese Raquin, featuring both period and contemporary elements. Emily Mortimer will play the lead.

The story is about a film director and two actors shooting a movie version of Zola’s novel and finding that it reflects experiences in their own lives.

In Toronto, another of Said Ben Said’s projects, David Mamet’s Blackbird starring Cate Blanchett, is being pre-sold by Solution Entertainment.

Production will begin in January next year on the Hitchcock-style thriller. Ben Said is financing the film through private equity investors.

David Cronenberg is now in post-production on another Ben Said-produced feature, Maps To The Stars, handled by eOne Films International.

Ben Said is also planning a new project with Philippe Garrel, after working on Venice selection Jealousy (La Jalousie).

The producer is also reuniting with Pascal Bonitzer (with whom he worked on Looking For Hortense) on a new feature - a comedy with the working title In Time Of Crisis (En Temps De Crise).

“I am very much director-driven. I like to produce movies I enjoy to watch,” Ben Said told ScreenDaily of his slate.