Last Friday Mo made aware the discussions between filmmaker Christopher Smith and Magnet Releasing (Magnolia’s genre arm), as the two sides entertained the notion of making a deal for Smith’s period-plague flick BLACK DEATH. Well ladies and gents…an official agreement has been struck!
Magnet will indeed distribute BLACK DEATH in the U.S., which stars Sean Bean stars as Ulric, a grim emissary from the Church, who leads a young monk (Eddie Redmayne) and a band of violent vigilantes and war veterans through the English countryside. Armed with blood-chilling torture devices, their mission is to stamp out suspected paganism in a village that remains untouched by the black plague, even as the rest of Europe grimly succumbs to the pestilence.
Eddie Redmayne, Carice van Houten (below), David Warner, Kimberly Nixon, Emun Elliot, John Lynch, Andy Nyman, Johnny Harris, Marianne Graffam and Tim McInnerny also play a role in the film.
No word when Magnet will re(release) the film, but a theatrical platform is being eyed for the first quarter of 2011.