Danny Trejo, Mischa Barton, Michael Madsen join AMBI Pictures' "Hope Lost"

AMBI Pictures, the film development, finance and production company owned and run by Andrea Iervolino and Monika Bacardi, has announced that Danny Trejo, Mischa Barton, Michael Madsen and Daniel Baldwin have signed on to star in the crime thriller Hope Lost.

The thriller, tackling prostitution and sex trafficking, is directed by David Petrucci from a screenplay written by Francesco Trento, Damiano Giacomelli and Francesco Teresi in collaboration with Loretta Tersigni. Additional cast include Andrey Chernishov, Francesca Agostini and Alessia Navarro.

Principal photography will commence this month in Rome. Iervolino and Bacardi are producing the film through their AMBI Pictures banner. Cosetta Turco is also a producer and Danielle Maloni is executive producer.

In the film, Barton plays a young woman who travels from her small town in Romania to a better life in Italy but is bought by a pimp (Madsen) and sold on to a brutal man (Trejo) who intends to torture them in a snuff movie.

Hope Lost is the latest film to be added to the growing AMBI slate. Iervolino and Bacardi are currently working on Barry Levinson-directed drama The Humbling, starring Al Pacino, Mandy Patinkin, Kyra Sedgwick, Charles Grodin and Dianne Wiest. Iervolino and Bacardi are co-producers – producing alongside Pacino, Jason Sosnoff and Ged Dickersin.

The Humbling is set on a farm in upstate New York that centers on the relationship between an aged, suicidal actor and a younger woman.

The company recently completed action thriller Sights of Death / S.O.D, starring Danny Glover, Daryl Hannah, Rutger Hauer, Stephen Baldwin and Michael Madsen.