George Clooney to Direct Movie About U.K. Phone Hacking Scandal

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even ppt?

Merged threads...

it sounds always good when he says "I'm the son of a newsman..." but I'm not a fan of it. Just because you are the "son of someone" doesn't make you automatically a Newsman and have the knowledge like a newsman.....I know George doesn't mean it this way but it sounds a bit this way.
Don't like sentence with I'm the son of ...I'm the daughter of......Next time the Kids of Obama do world politic because they are "the daughter of..."

OK I'm done........sorry....

I don't understand George email and the connection with all this Steven Jobbs article and Sony hack emails and Hack attack..... I understand George email connecting with hack attack but not with Steven Jobbs (sevens link) and the sony hack emails.....Can somebody explain (for blond People ) please. I think I'm missing a Point here....

Sorry Nicky George has no involvements with the Steve Jobs project 
but it's the same executive from Sony whose mailbox got hacked 
so a lot of Information was leaked. Most dramatic
fights are among the Steve Jobs things, 
while our George provides some funny jokes with Amy.

Nicky - I think they meant that George seemed to assume (when nobody else did) that they might be hacked - and he's telling the hackers to fuck off. I think he operates as if everything is hackable and is very careful about what he puts out on electronic media.

I don't think it's that complicated. 

I think His Nibs was emailing Amy Pascal about buying the rights of the book Hack Attack, and what the implications of making the film could be. His email just turned out to be one of those hacked - which he had made a joke about..........

PAN - Isn't it funny that George jokes about people "listening in" and, not long after, SONY gets hacked? As if everything gets hacked so watch out! The press here is blaming the hack on N Korea, but I wonder if Rupert Murdoch might not have wanted to know just how bad he'll look in Hack Attack.

thanks guys for explaining.

and yes Lizzy, it is funny that George makes a joke about "listening in" and then Sony gets hacked. George might has a second sight or he is involved in criminal hacking acts

Moved the conversation about Sony hacked emails to the thread below

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Nicky80 wrote:thanks guys for explaining.

and yes Lizzy, it is funny that George makes a joke about "listening in" and then Sony gets hacked. George might has a second sight or he is involved in criminal hacking acts

Anybody who knew what Murdoch did in the UK and continued to be careless in their corporate communications is dangerously close to dumb. Not saying they deserved to be hacked, but they can't exactly be held blameless for anything that happens to them because of it.

Lizzy. there is no way Rupert Murdoch will not be aware of any of this and how he will not exactly come out of it smelling of roses!

This is a HUGE story and has been going on in the UK for years, and included the Levenson Inquiry where Murdoch was called to give evidence (with Deng by his side who famously handbagged someone to protect her husband), and he portrayed himself as someone who was very old and not sure what was going on on in his own own corporation. His son was also called to give evidence at the inquiry.


There followed the trials of Rebekah Brooks and many other Newscorp executives, Andy Coulson who had gone on to be David Cameron's press chief and was convicted, and a million others within the newspaper world with lots and lots of evidence, and defence and prosecuting counsels for each and every hack/photographer/gofer accused. 

There are still journalists and photographers on trial now and many to come, but without so many headlines.

I really really hope His Nibs does the book as it has been written from the perspective of the author and what he discovers - All the Presidents Men-style if you like........

If you can look online at a copy of Private Eye, you will find lots more stuff. The best account I've seen of everything that went on.

Sorry to bang on. You probably know loads about it - it wasn't exactly on the back page in a corner............!

PAN- I was joking about Murdoch hacking SONY. He knows how he came off in the book and how he will probably look in the movie - especially knowing how George feels about the tabloids. I'd be willing to bet, though, that he will want to get some kind of revenge if the movie makes him look really bad. I hope George is preparing himself for whatever Murdoch throws his way.

I just found a video of the screenplay writer Anthony McCarten talking about this project and how he got involved in the project with George, and another video of Nick Davies, the writer of the book, talking about George and the film adaptation as well, thought you guys would like to see them since there hasn't been a whole lot of info on this project yet....

Here's Anthony McCarten at a script writer's panel, start the clip at 44:23 mins in...

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And here's Nick Davies talking about it, start the clip at 1:23:48 mins in...

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Enjoy!

I did enjoy Kat. There hasn't been much talk yet about Hack Attack. So it was great to get some insight into how and when George initially got involved and what his vision is for the film. This one is definitely in his "wheelhouse"!

I'd love to read the book. The chatter here last year was that it was a pretty detailed story with lots and lots of characters. I may try to tackle it by summer's end.

Thanks for the links.

Brilliant find, kat. What a scoop!

Interesting that Davies was contacted as long ago as three years back when he was writing articles in the paper about it............

some interviews of the screenplay writer talking about the film:
What’s next for him and if he’s got a passion project he wants to attempt now:
AM: And Mr. George Clooney called me up! I’m working on his next directorial movie. It’s very early days, but it’s very exciting to be working with him. It was a long distance call and his voice kept coming in and out, but I thought it would be too rude to interrupt him, so I probably didn’t come off too well, but it didn’t seem to put him off, so we’re underway on a joint project, which is really really exciting.
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MM: Lastly, what can you tell me about Hack Attack?

AM: I’m tremendously excited to be working with George Clooney. He’s one of the world’s great directors. I absolutely adored Good Night, and Good Luck and this is a return to that territory for him. I was a journalist myself and care very passionately about it. And when journalism becomes detached from the truth, we’re all in trouble. This movie will look at the role of journalism, what we want it to be, what it is, and the realization that democracy is something that you have to keep fighting for. It’s never a given.
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Much faster tracked is the script he's penning for George Clooney's next directorial effort and it returns us neatly to creative bargaining. First, he admits following his own best advice in that "Hack Attack" is "sharing the runway" with "Darkest Hour," which he describes as "a passion project of mine. It looks at a month in the life of Winston Churchill, who I've been fascinated-stroke-obsessed-with most of my adult life." But it's the script based upon British journalist Nick Davies' book about the phone-tapping scandal that nearly toppled Rupert Murdoch's empire that's keeping him up at night. And it's being distributed by, wait for it, Sony.

"With my own work," McCarten says, "I don't have to argue with anyone when I want to make changes. But I'm still doing research at the moment and getting deep into that whole scandal, which is so of the moment. It's really about freedom of speech, censorship, self-censorship, the relationship of the media to truth, and what happens when that's severed. But it's not my own work, so there's negotiation. Once again, that offers limitation, but sometimes it's those limitations that spur on some originality."
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I like the fact that McCarten was a journalist. And a passionate one so he says. A connection for him and George.

Without having read the book yet I still think writing the screenplay is going to be a huge challenge. But I cannot wait to see this one!

Thanks Sevens.

Surfing - If the earlier reports are accurate. Smokehouse is working with SONY to produce "Hack Attack", so the financing is already there.

I just hope SONY doesn't screw up promotion and publicity like they did for "Tomorrowland".

Which papers does Murdoch own?

In the UK? The Sun (tabloid red top - highest readership of a daily in the UK - well known for page 3 naked women pix every day - think he may have given that up), the Times (top end newpaper), the Sunday Times (same), and the Sun on Sunday (formerly the News of the World) estimated readership of 26 million. 

And that's just the newspapers here. I could go on.......Hello magazine, Sky,..........

Lizzy, SONY didn't produce TOMORROWLAND, that's a Disney project.

Sevens -Of course you're right. Don't know where my head is today!  Thanks for catching my mistake.  

Silje wrote:Which papers does Murdoch own?

Just google "NewsCorp media outlets". There are lots of lists of Murdoch's holdings - way too many to post here.

Bumping this to say I wonder what is going on with this film...? I remember George saying that it would be his next project. Thought we would've heard something about it by now -such as casting news, etc - if they were planning to shoot it early in the new year to be ready for fall/winter 2016 award season. But there hasn't been any news on it. I wonder if the script is not up to par. Or what the delay may be...? Hopefully we hear something soon.

Mm, wondered too, Kat, and I think Anthony McCarten is doing a Churchill bio for Working Title too.

This article from December last year explains where he's at I think. Looks like Churchill is coming first..


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kat it's nice to hear from you.  Miss your posts.

When it first was announced that George was going to do Hack Attack those who had read the book  said it would be a huge undertaking considering all the characters involved.  Lots of detail.  Can only imagine that writing the screenplay will be a challenge.  I would rather wait as long as it takes to get a solid and well written story that translates well to the screen.  

Maybe George will start work on the latest Coen Brothers' project, Suburbicon.

It just struck me that along with this being a difficult script to write, it might be a difficult project to cast. I wonder if Murdoch's power in the media would make people hesitate to do the film. Hopefully not, and they can assemble an A-list cast - but I do wonder if fear of repercussions could be a factor for some actors.

I would assume this is going to be mostly a British cast. And a huge one at that.   I have a lot more faith in today's crop of actors (both A-list and those who work in smaller independent projects) that they would not be intimidated by a powerhouse figure like Murdoch.   Certainly George isn't .....