The legendary John Carpenter (Halloween, The Fog, In the Mouth of Madness, The Thing), will direct The Ward, written by Michael and Shawn Rasmussen. Amber Heard (All the Boys Love Mandy Lane) has signed on to star. The Ward is an intense psychological thriller set in a mental institution where a young woman, Kristen (played by Heard) is haunted by a mysterious and deadly ghost. As danger creeps closer, she comes to realize that this ghost might be darker than she could have imagined. Production is scheduled for a May start.
““The Ward” is the kind of script that I’ve been looking for: a complex, visceral story, full of suspense and scares,” said Carpenter. “I am especially pleased to be working with Amber because I know she will create a powerful central performance.”
“The Ward” is being produced by Doug Mankoff, Mike Marcus and Andy Spaulding of Echo Lake Entertainment, which recently wrapped production on “The Joneses”, co-starring Heard. Financing and producing alongside Echo Lake will be Peter Block and his recently launched company A Bigger Boat.
“Working with John Carpenter on “The Ward” is a dream come true; fans everywhere, me included, have been waiting for just this kind of thriller from him. It’s great to be able to tackle it with the Echo Lake gang whose work I’ve also admired for years,” said Block.
Heard is repped by Endeavor, Hyler Management and attorney Karl Austen. Her credits include “Pineapple Express,” “Never Back Down,” and “All The Boys Love Mandy Lane” as well as the series “Californication”. Carpenter is repped by William Morris and Echo Lake Management. Writers Michael and Shawn Rasmussen are repped by Larchmont Literary Agency.
Echo Lake has added more commercial fare such as “The Ward” and “The Joneses” to its long track record of award winning arthouse films including titles like “Tsotsi”, “Water”, and “Away From Her”. “We are excited to bring our focus on quality to bigger, more mainstream films” says Doug Mankoff, President of Echo Lake. “We saw firsthand what a great job Amber did on “The Joneses” and we knew that she and John Carpenter would make a perfect combination for “The Ward”."
FilmNation, the sales company started by Glen Basner, will begin international sales on the film at the Berlin Film Market next week.
Sweet, Love Heard and John Carpenter's older stuff rocks, so this is some good news. Maybe this will prompt Senator to release Mandy Lane once and for all.
Allow me to go out on a limb and say that this sounds like a good platform for Carpenter to do something "Carpenter" with. Riot sounds like a frigin train wreck. Carpenter was always best with atmosphere, desperation and the ghostiness of things like he did with Mouth of Madness and the Prince of Darkness message sequences... Sounds promising.
I love Amber Heard and John Carpenter...what a great combo! Finally, a horror film I'm looking forward to. Still, waiting to see 'All the Boys Love Mandy Lane'.
before I'll shout "Yeah cool, Carpenter is back." for the millionth time, I'll wait till it's actually in production. How many projects has John been attached to last few years, and how many have we actually seen. The only thing so far is Masters of Horror, even Fear itself didn't go through.
Anyway I do want my favourite director back, it's just that I don't want to get exited over nothing.
I'm with you Evil_Flip. I'm getting so sick of seeing things that he is attached to never come to pass. What happened to Psychopath, The 13th Apostle, L.A. Gothic, The Prince, and Riot? I'll believe it when, as you say, it goes into production. Maybe he is just getting ready to unleash a bunch of films because he's been so lazy of late. He's my favorite director, and the reason I got into this business. I hope this happens. For now, it is a very muted hooray.
hope Carpenter still got some of that movie magic left in him....give the man a few million and he works wonders but give him millions and hes only has good has the rest.
cool...hey jma why wouldnt they release mandy lane?
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