'Alec Baldwin' film released six years after completion

[edonline]

http://film.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,2123680,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=16

'Alec Baldwin' film released six years after completion
Staff and agencies
Wednesday July 11, 2007

Guardian Unlimited

Poor Alec Baldwin. As if suffering the embarrassment of seeing an angry phone call you made to your 11-year-old daughter leaked onto YouTube wasn't enough, the Oscar-nominated actor recently heard that a film he asked his name to be removed from is to be released - a full six years after it was supposed to hit cinemas.

The Devil and Daniel Webster was directed by Baldwin and stars Anthony Hopkins, Jennifer Love Hewitt and Dan Aykroyd, as well as the Glengarry Glen Ross star himself. Based on the titular novel by Stephen Vincent Benet, the film hit the skids in 2001 during post-production when the FBI seized the investors' assets, including the film, in the course of a bank fraud investigation.

Baldwin subsequently asked for his name to be removed from the credits but the film was eventually sold to a new distribution company, the Yari Film Group. Boasting the new name Shortcut To Happiness, the film is to be finally released this weekend in the US. It has reportedly been re-edited into an unrecognisable form, with the bogus director 'Harry Kirkpatrick' listed on the credits.

Baldwin has not made any public comment on the film's release, but the US gossip site PageSix reports that he is advising his fans not to see it.

The movie has a Faustian theme, with Baldwin playing a down-on-his-luck writer upset by the success of a close friend, who makes a deal with the devil, played by Love Hewitt, to bring him untold wealth.

It is being released in six US cities on Friday - though not, perhaps, the six US cities where a film might usually be screened on limited release. Rather than LA, New York and Chicago etc, the film will be seen by cinemagoers in Las Vegas, Rochester, Fort Myers, Columbus, Albuquerque and Santa Fe.

[ilovemovies]

Well I saw the trailer and it does indeed look pretty awful. However, I still want to see it. I've been intrigued by this movie for years and even if it's suppose to be a disaster, I still want to see it.

[teenkiller]

What a strange story. Why would Baldwin adivse people not to see it. Unless he thought it was a total piece of shit himself. I kind of like Alec. Too bad something like this had to happen to him. His SNL skits are always pretty funny. Well thats all for now GOoD JOURNEY my fellow schmoes.

[DaveyJoeG]

Originally posted by teenkiller
Why would Baldwin adivse people not to see it. Unless he thought it was a total piece of shit himself.

You just answered your own question.

[Cronos]

i remember reading about this film a year or 2 ago and while it sounds terrible i'll probably check it out out of interest to see what happened to it

[JJFlamingo]

Gosh, a film with Baldwin, Hopkins, Love Hewitt, and Aykroyd and it's supposed to suck?? I gotta see this!...:D

[Backstabba]

I remember hearing about this, but I never heard about a horrible trailer...

Where is this horrible trailer?
Someone link me to this horrible trailer!

[Cronos]

well, here's the trailer for Shortcut To Happiness (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrZhqTK5LRg)

[bigred760]

There's another thread about this movie somewhere on these boards. It's endless delay had been talked about for a while. I'm curious to see it, hell just to see Jennifer Love Hewitt play the devil.

[bigred760]

Originally posted by Cronos
well, here's the trailer for Shortcut To Happiness (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrZhqTK5LRg)

It's not a great trailer, but it's not that bad either.

Something tells me it was hastily put together to try to let the word out that this movie exists.

[inglourious basterd]

According to IMDB, Baldwin was the producer and director. The name "Harry Kirkpatrick" is a fake name that he gave.

I don't know about you guys, but if the lead actor, producer, and director openly advertises that this is shit, then I'd believe that it's shit.

Another quote supporting the OP:

Source: IMDb

According to Alec Baldwin, the film was extensively re-edited after it came into the possession of Bob Yari Productions, and no longer bears any resemblance to its original form or to the Benet short story, hence the title change. Baldwin has since requested that his name be removed from the credits as director and producer.

[Brando @$$ Fat]

Doesn't look like shit but doesn't look like a good movie either.

[edonline]

Originally posted by psudoazn
According to IMDB, Baldwin was the producer and director. The name "Harry Kirkpatrick" is a fake name that he gave.
...

From what I understand, "Harry Kirkpatrick" is a name the studios uses when a director wants his name removed from a movie. It's not something that Baldwin chose himself.

[gyro_44]

Originally posted by edonline
From what I understand, "Harry Kirkpatrick" is a name the studios uses when a director wants his name removed from a movie. It's not something that Baldwin chose himself.
Alan Smithee is the most famous psuedonym used when a director doesn't want his own name on the film.

I don't think I've seen Harry Kirkpatrick used before, but it has the same purpose.

This is a weird story with this one, I remember hearing about it five years ago.

[Scarface98.9]

How can a movie that was seized by the FBI be sold to a production company when it's concievably evidence?

[echo_bravo]

I'll see it for J-Love's tits.

[inglourious basterd]

I just had another thought though..

I thought that American History X was a brilliant film. But director, Tony Kaye, wanted to take his name off it as well. In fact, he wanted his pseudonym to be "Humpty Dumpty". They didn't let him take his name off the film because he violated a Director's Guild rule. Kaye eventually sued for $200+ million.

My point is that -- who k nows? Maybe this film could surprise us. Lets wait for the reviews.

[Buck Turgidson]

I wouldn't have brought it up, but...I feel compelled to point out that Tony Kaye is a worthless, and probably literally insane, piece of shit.

[gyro_44]

Originally posted by Buck Turgidson
I wouldn't have brought it up, but...I feel compelled to point out that Tony Kaye is a worthless, and probably literally insane, piece of shit.
Why did he not want his name on American History X?

Sounds like you know the answer.

[Brando @$$ Fat]

Originally posted by gyro_44
Why did he not want his name on American History X?


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2007/06/10/svkaye10.xml


We have come to the small Southern college town of Wilmington, North Carolina, because an arts club has invited Kaye to introduce a screening of American History X - 'which I'm not so comfortable about,' he says. Kaye's anxiety about the film goes back a long way. At the 1998 Academy Awards, the movie won a best-actor nomination for Edward Norton, who stars as the leader of a gang of Californian neo-Nazis, and has since gathered a strong cult following. 'It's No 16 on Best Dramas of All Time on the IMDb [Internet Movie Database]', he says. 'It's become quite a little classic in its own befuddled way.' But the battle over artistic control of the film, which has become part of Hollywood folklore, all but destroyed Kaye's career. He delivered his original cut on time and within budget - but when the producer, New Line Cinema, insisted on changes, the arguments began. 'I'm fully aware that I'm a first-time director, but I need the same autonomy and respect that Stanley Kubrick gets,' he said at the time


In the end, it wasn't his film. Norton did most of the work because Kaye had no idea what he was doing, and apparently New Line Cinema also wasn't happy with the very little portion of the film that was actually his vision. I'd probably feel the same way.

[teenkiller]

I had heard something about Kaye not being happy because Norton was giving himself more screen time than Kaye had wanted. I didn't know all that issue with the studios involvement though. I hear Kaye has a movie finally coming out. His first since American History X. It would be interesting to see how this experience turns out. Well thats all for now GOoD JOURNEY my fellow schmoes.