Vincent D'Onofrio's DOWN AND DIRTY role as Harvey Weinstein!

The man who convinced as Orson Welles is to play the monstrous figure of studio exec Harvey Weinstein!

If it were me, I would make Down And Dirty Pictures into a movie about Harvey Weinstein. Especially with the versatile Vincent D'Onofrio on board as the ex-Miramax boss, an intriguing and congratulate casting choice. My adaptation would have been a movie about greed, about uncompromising execs, about getting results by whatever means necessary, with the Gordon Gekko of film producing at the forefront. I would have been happy with the man who played Orson Welles and got away with, to play such a monstrous figure.Vincent DOnofrio to Play Harvey Weinstein in DOWN AND DIRTY PICTURES

D'Onofrio (left), Weinstein (right). Of course we are still getting all of that above but PalmStar Pictures' movie, based on Peter Biskind's salacious novel about the rise of the Indie movie scene of the 90's, 1/3rd of which is about the former Miramax studio head, will also tackle the rest of Biskind's book. I've read Down and Dirty Pictures, and it's a little ambitious for a full on feature. Biskind's writings, which ironically could have done with an editor (one of the recurring jokes is about the re-cutting practices of "Harvey Scissorhands"), is cluttered and unfocused, and unless you're a film nerd, where's the interest? I mean, at the end of the day, how are they going to sell a movie to Joe Public about how Indie films became cool in the early 90's because of guys like Robert Rodriguez, Quentin Tarantino, Richard Linklater, Kevin Smith and Steven Soderbergh, before that movement was made corporate, and in the end, virtually killed off by guys like Harvey Weinstein? A literal film adaptation doesn't stand a chance, whereas a feature focusing on Harvey - his greed and manipulation of the industry, would make a fine narrative for a $10 million budgeted flick. Still, I'm kinda fascinated to see how this one plays out. down and dirty pictures biskindThe mostly anecdotal book depicts famous guys in the industry shouting at each other... where's the movie? Kenneth Boswer, the same guy who made the documentary Easy Riders, Raging Bulls, based on Biskind's earlier novel, is set to helm the feature from a script by Dean Craig (Death at a Funeral) and Joshua James (Alien Uprising). Jeff Wells said in April 2008...
the script isn't half bad. At the very least it has a certain bold, punchy recklessness. It's a movie within a "movie" with lots of yelling, arguing, maneuvering, jousting. It breaks down the fourth wall with characters talking to the camera. I muttered the word "Fellini-eseque" to myself at one point. It also reminded me at times of American Splendor.
Ryan Bingham and Jeff Lipsky (co-heads October Films, and fierce rival of Weinsteins/Miramax) are also characters who make up large parts of this ensemble. Dozens of film personalities (such as Tarantino, Rodriguez and Kevin Smith) will need to be cast, as it's unlikely any of them would appear as themselves and cut off future relations with Harvey. IMDB say Hugh Dancy, Matthew Perry, Andy Serkis, Sally Hawkins, Elias Koteas and Toby Jones are also on board but playing who - we don't know. Nor do we know when it will film. Here's the first four pages of a 112 page script from a Craig/James draft of a few years ago... down1down2down3down4
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Matt Holmes is the co-founder of What Culture, formerly known as Obsessed With Film. He has been blogging about pop culture and entertainment since 2006 and has written over 10,000 articles.