No, not the 24 movie sadly. Kiefer Sutherland is in talks to star in a film called Married and Cheating.
The movie follows three couples experiencing infidelity, deceit and confusion. Other actors attached to the project include Sarah Jessica Parker, Eva Longoria, and Brendan Fraser.
Married and Cheating will shoot from July to September, between the hiatus of Touch, which was recently picked up for a second season by FOX.
Should we take bets on how many films Kiefer Sutherland will do before we get our long-awaited ’24’ movie?
Source: Variety (thanks Jack for the heads up!)
19 Comments
Comments ClosedGerry Mander
May 11, 2012 at 10:59 pm24fan07
May 12, 2012 at 2:43 amThat’s 10 projects that aren’t named “24 The Movie”.
I’ll give him credit for working hard and keeping busy, but those are all mediocre projects that nobody cares about to be honest. Transitioning from being the highest paid actor on TV to starring in a Hulu web series that nobody watched was a massive downgrade in the credibility of his career. Melancholia was a complete flop, these indie romantic movies he is doing will be flops too. Touch is doing poorly in the ratings and getting laughed at by critics. While it was lucky enough to get a second season, it’s not going to get a third. The show will never win any awards and the Martin Bohm character will never be remembered in the same way as Jack Bauer was.
Kiefer seems to care more about quantity than quality – he is accepting any role that comes his way, and that worries me. Starring in a bunch of terrible/flop movies was the precise reason he took a break from Hollywood over a decade ago and it looks like history is repeating itself.
RorshachLives!
May 12, 2012 at 3:17 amAnd the reason the ’24’ movie hasn’t happened yet is not because of Kiefer’s other work, it’s because firstly they couldn’t do it while the series was ongoing, then when the series ended they were actively working on the script for nearly two years to get it right, then (and I’ll have to grit my teeth here) 20th Century Fox dragged their feet throughout this year in green-lighting the movie for a late April or early May production start, and when they did finally get back to Imagine Entertainment in early March concerning the ’24’ movie, they insulted them by saying the movie wasn’t worth more than a miserly $30million budget, and by the time the dust had settled on that bombshell, the clock had run out and the ’24’ movie people had no choice but to postpone until next year…
I think it’s probably a good thing they’re waiting until next year, but the problems with the studio may yet persist, are they going to give the ’24’ movie the budget it deserves? I actually understand Fox’s caution over the ’24’ movie and it’s potential at the box-office, clearly ratings were down year-on-year on the show, and the Season 8 DVD and Blu ray didn’t sell as well as previous seasons, and I also understand that it’s not just the production budget but also the additional advertising/prints/distribution costs that have to be taken into consideration, but $30million, really?
Had both sides shown some leeway and met each other further inroad than they both wanted to go, I am absolutely certain they could have got the current ’24’ movie script budget to an even $40million without having to sacrifice the integrity of the piece, and maybe, just maybe, we would have had it done this year, but I just hope both sides in this little tiff show some fair compromise in the next twelve months so we can FINALLY have a ’24’ feature film in cinemas before we all die of old age!
24fan07
May 12, 2012 at 4:31 amKiefer is attaching himself to largely uninteresting projects that aren’t challenging him as an actor, his performances aren’t receiving praise or winning awards, and the films are absolutely tanking (“Twelve” did a pathetic $0.2M, and “Melancholia” did just $3M). You better believe that when an actor stars in a string of flops, it reflects poorly on his or her career.
Like you said, Kiefer has more than enough money to live comfortably. So it’s not like he has to accept these terrible roles in order to make a living. But he seemingly says yes to every role put before him.
As for the 24 movie stuff… There’s no way it takes over two years to write a script for a movie, unless the project is stuck in development hell (as the 24 movie appears to be). Billy Ray was hired MONTHS before the series even finished, so in my opinion there’s no valid excuse for why production couldn’t have started in 2010.
Obviously I cannot say for sure whether Kiefer’s projects delayed it, but my hunch is that they definitely played a part. There was no rush to do script rewrites on the 24 movie or start pre-production when Kiefer was committed to a Broadway play for several months. Then as soon as that was done he accepts a starring role on a television show, so again, no rush as he’ll be busy for at least another couple months. And Kiefer even admitted that Touch getting a second season is a big reason for the film being delayed another year.
Personally, I would rather Kiefer relax on the other projects and dedicate himself to getting the 24 movie made. He could’ve easily transitioned from high profile TV actor to a movie star. But instead he’s wasted several years of his career being “out of the spotlight” in these small/bad films, and the end result is that the 24 movie will also suffer for it too, because 20th Century Fox isn’t going to give a large budget to something that’s been out of the public mindset for so long.
Guest
May 12, 2012 at 4:34 amCatherine
May 12, 2012 at 4:37 amOn the other hand, before 24, Kiefer made a lot of crappy movies (like “after Alice”, “Frankie the fly”…) some end up directly in video. I love him, I have the luck to meet him (a few seconds in Broadway) he’s a nice guy with fans, but he has no taste when he chooses his movies…too bad, he’s a great actor !
Jack's lunchbox
May 12, 2012 at 9:26 amAs for other films Kiefer has made in the past years, Mirrors was an above-average horror thriller (not technically great though, I know) and Monsters vs Aliens is a pretty good animated film.
24fan07
May 12, 2012 at 12:02 pmJack’s lunchbox: Melancholia is the only movie Kiefer did in the last few years that was positively reviewed (77% on RottenTomatoes). Despite the praise, as far as I know Kiefer himself was not nominated for a single award on Melancholia. That film had a tiny $7.5 million budget and failed to make back even half of that (just $3m lifetime box office gross). So in the end it’s just another failure on his film resume.
Type Kiefer’s name into boxofficemojo.com, and look at the lifetime grosses of his movies in the last decade. They are all extremely low except for Monsters vs Aliens (an animated film which he only did voice work for, barely counts in my opinion). When the movie studios see that all his recent film releases performed poorly, they won’t consider him a bankable star or offer him big budget movies. And Kiefer only has himself to blame for that, by agreeing to star in these mediocre projects.
Catherine
May 12, 2012 at 12:45 pmIn interview Kiefer says often that there are films, movies and cinema and his father did cinema (he quotes “Klute” “1900” “Casanova”…) So may be it’s that kind of “cinema” he wants to do now…too bad !!
24bauerfan
May 12, 2012 at 4:13 pmIf we discount the two voice roles kiefer has done since 24 (Marmaduke and Monster vs Aliens), we are left with Touch, Melancholia and The Confession.
Touch – received “generally positive reviews” on metacritic and Kiefer is in the mix for being nominated for an Emmy
Melancholia – it was a HUGE success. Yes, it’s an ART Film, so it didn’t get seen by many people. But it WON the National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Film. And just because he wasn’t nominated doesn’t mean the film wasn’t good. Kristen Dunst (the lead actress in melancholia) won the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actress so… for lack of a better expression, your argument is invalid…
The Confession – it created a huge ammount of interest in the industry and was very well received
Kiefer hasn’t done big films, that’s for sure. But those which he HAS done have all been pretty well received.
I rest my case.
24fan07
May 12, 2012 at 6:25 pmThere was almost zero buzz on The Confession, even amongst the most hardcore Kiefer fans. Do you remember that contest to get the director 20,000 followers for an invite to the screening with Kiefer? Despite being spammed all over Twitter/Facebook for months, that contest was a horrible failure, over a year later and Brad Mirman still has less than 3,000 followers. That was the amount of interest in the project: most people just didn’t care. Another rough way to judge the audience is by looking at the trailer stats on YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVcSczfLn48) which was uploaded 2 months before it premiered. Surely anyone with interest in the series would check out the trailer, right? Only 123,000 views to date. I am not saying The Confession was bad, just that very few people watched it.
Touch on the other hand IS a bad show. The ratings on Metacritic are only for the first episode (pilot episode). Most critics since then have turned against it/laugh at it because the storytelling has gotten worse and it’s super repetitive. When it was renewed a lot of the big television critics on Twitter were making fun of it (http://twitter.com/#!/MattMitovich/status/200389865479737345 , http://twitter.com/#!/jeffsetter/status/200389808223297536 etc). Unless a miracle happens and the ratings double, Touch will not get a third season. The 24 movie is being delayed due to a far less popular series that few people watch or care about. It is disappointing to say the least.
24bauerfan
May 12, 2012 at 7:42 pmYes, Touch has become a bit repetitive, I’ll admit that but it deserves more than people are giving it credit for. Doing a serialized show ON BROADCAST TV these days is a death sentence. It almost always has been, except for 24, The West Wing and Lost.
As for the confession… once again, quality not quantiy.
Kiefer doesn’t seem to be going for the first commercial film he gets. And I’m actually liking that.
AlexDiane24
May 12, 2012 at 7:57 pmGerry Mander
May 12, 2012 at 11:49 pm@24fan07, it DID take nearly two years to get the ’24’ movie script right, Billy Ray was hired to do the script in February 2010, he handed the first draft in around late April/early May, was rejected by the studio in late December that year. Work continued on and off until around October last year when Kiefer announced it was nearly done, and that Billy Ray was still working on it, around November it was then handed over to Mark Bomback for rewrites and polishing, with Bomback finishing by late 2011 or early 2012, it then took 20th Century Fox until early March this year to make a proposition to Imagine Entertainment concerning budget, salary, etc, an offer that was rightly turned down for being insultingly low, and by that time, there was no more time to start prepping for production this April or May, it was postponed to next year, and this is where we are currently, so you see that it was indeed around two years to get the script right, but it was the studio’s fault the ’24’ movie isn’t being filmed as we speak…
That being said, you are absolutely correct in stating that because Kiefer’s non-’24’ film work – animated films notwithstanding – has not exactly set the box-office alight, and indeed most have been flops, relatively speaking, that 20th Century Fox are more reluctant to shell out big bucks for the ’24’ movie if it’s starring someone with a less than stellar record of box-office returns, but at the same time, the ’24’ brand is bigger than just Kiefer Sutherland, even though he embodies it, in the same way the James Bond, the Batman, the Superman, or the Spider-Man brands are bigger than the actors who portray those characters.
I have to admit though, I reluctantly agree with what RorshachLives! said above about both sides in the ’24’ movie – 20th Century Fox and Imagine Entertainment – having to compromise and give some leeway in this dispute, I think $40m would be a totally respectable but still responsible budget for the ’24’ movie, Imagine are not going to get the budget they hope for, and Fox are going to have to give more money than they wished to spend, both sides need to meet each other half-way, or we’ll either not get a ’24’ movie at all, or we’ll get one so watered-down and compromised that it will sink at the box-office (like the last ‘X-Files’ movie), and that really will be the end of ’24’ as we know it… at least, until the inevitable reboot about twenty years from now…
Northern Star
May 13, 2012 at 12:24 am’21 Jump Street’ – $42million
‘Contraband’ – either $25million or $40million (depending on where you look)
‘Haywire’ – $23million
‘Lockout’ – $30million
So you see the average cost of an action movie, excluding the big star-driven ones, is around the low $20m-low $40m range, an area which 20th Century Fox seems to put the potential ’24’ movie, I can see why they put out the $30million budget offer to Imagine, but it was still low-balling it, and it deserves at least a $40million budget as some here have suggested, I hope this gets sorted out pretty soon…
Northern Star
May 13, 2012 at 2:18 amJack's lunchbox
May 21, 2012 at 3:37 pmKiefer wasn’t the lead, he was billed third behind Kirsten Dunst and Charlotte Gainsbourg, but his performance got positive feedback, as did the film, so I’m sorry but there’s nothing wrong with him being on Melancholia (Marmaduke or Twelve, on the other hand, that’s not as glorifying).
But anyway it’s not on such a film that a big studio like 20th Century Fox is going to judge Kiefer’s ability to draw audiences for a potential blockbuster like the 24 movie. If they greenlight the film, it will only be because of the popular success of 24 worldwide, not because of Kiefer’s cinematic career since 24.
sempijja lawrence
June 4, 2012 at 4:06 amsempijja lawrence
August 17, 2012 at 1:46 pm