Deadline (2009 film)
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

''Deadline'' is a 2009 American
psychological horror Psychological horror is a genre, subgenre of horror fiction, horror and psychological fiction with a particular focus on mental, emotional, and Mental state, psychological states to frighten, disturb, or unsettle its audience. The subgenre frequent ...
film directed by Sean McConville and starring
Brittany Murphy Brittany Anne Murphy-Monjack (; November 10, 1977 – December 20, 2009) was an American actress and singer. Born in Atlanta, Murphy moved to Los Angeles as a teenager and pursued a career in acting. Her breakthrough role was as Tai Fras ...
and
Thora Birch Thora Birch (born March 11, 1982) is an American actress and producer. She made her feature film debut in 1988 with a starring role in ''Purple People Eater'', for which she received a Young Artist Award for "Best Young Actress Under Nine Years ...
.


Plot

Alice Evans needs to complete a screenplay, which she has not finished due to a psychological breakdown after her boyfriend, Ben, tried to kill her. With the deadline for the screenplay approaching, she accepts an offer by a producer friend to let her stay in a Victorian-style home he has recently purchased, so she can focus on her work. She insists on staying there alone, and her friend Rebecca reluctantly agrees and leaves her there. Alice begins to hear strange noises in the house and becomes convinced the house is haunted by the ghost of a murdered woman. She begins searching the house and finds a collection of videotapes in the attic featuring a mysterious young couple, Lucy and David Woods. At first the tapes just show the couple lovingly talking about their new baby and life together in the house. However, as the tapes progress, the more disturbed David grows. He becomes convinced Lucy is seeing someone else and that the baby may not be his, even though she assures him she's never been with any one else. One tape shows him filming Lucy as she sleeps muttering "she looks like an angel." Alice also watches one of her own tapes of herself and Rebecca (before Ben tried to kill her) and it is strongly implied she and Rebecca are more than just friends. Alice keeps watching the video tapes of the Woods and asks Rebecca to do research on the couple for her. Feeling worried about Alice, Rebecca offers to come visit, but Alice insists she is fine. As she keeps watching the tapes, we learn the reason Ben tried to kill Alice: like Lucy Woods, Alice was pregnant and, like David Woods, Ben became convinced the baby wasn't his. Also like David Woods, Ben tried to drown Alice in the bathtub. She survived, but lost the baby. This is why Alice feels so connected to Lucy. She starts to see the ghost of Lucy Woods around the house. When Alice gets to the last tape, she sees that David did kill Lucy by drowning her in the tub and then hanged himself. Alice then gets a call from Ben, who apologizes for what he did to her. During the call, Alice sees a shadow in the house and becomes convinced Ben is inside with her, and that he has been responsible for everything that has been happening while she was there, but he insists he is in Boston with his mother. Still, Alice is afraid and starts to run away, but at that point, she sees the end of the tape which shows David Woods actually survived his hanging when his mother cut him down just in time. His mother then reports David and Lucy missing. Alice comes face to face with David Woods inside the house. He calls her "Lucy" and thinks Alice is his wife. He catches her and tries to drown her in the bathtub, but then he sees the ghost of his dead wife, Lucy, standing beside him. This scares him so much, he falls backward over the stair railing and dies. Lucy's ghost then lets the water out of the bathtub and saves Alice's life. Later, Rebecca comes over and finds Alice still lying in the tub muttering about the ghost. Rebecca pulls her out of the tub, and as she dries her off, she finds the screen play that Alice has been working on all this time. She discovers it is word for word the entire story Alice has been telling her; it is now clear that everything Alice saw was all in her head. Rebecca then promises she will never again leave Alice alone and puts her to bed. Rebecca goes downstairs where she finds a video camera on the floor where the body of David Woods would have been. She picks it up and watches a tape Alice shot of Rebecca sleeping that looks exactly like the earlier scene shown of David shooting Lucy as she slept, right down to Alice saying she looks like an angel.


Cast

*
Brittany Murphy Brittany Anne Murphy-Monjack (; November 10, 1977 – December 20, 2009) was an American actress and singer. Born in Atlanta, Murphy moved to Los Angeles as a teenager and pursued a career in acting. Her breakthrough role was as Tai Fras ...
as Alice Evans *
Thora Birch Thora Birch (born March 11, 1982) is an American actress and producer. She made her feature film debut in 1988 with a starring role in ''Purple People Eater'', for which she received a Young Artist Award for "Best Young Actress Under Nine Years ...
as Lucy Woods *
Tammy Blanchard Tammy Blanchard (born December 14, 1976) is an American actress. She rose to prominence for her role as teenage Judy Garland in the critically acclaimed television film '' Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows'' (2001), for which she received ...
as Rebecca *
Marc Blucas Marcus Paul Blucas (born January 11, 1972) is an American actor. Prior to his acting career, he played college basketball with the Wake Forest Demon Deacons. He had his first starring role as soldier and love interest Riley Finn on the WB super ...
as David Woods * Claudia Troll as David's Mother * Michael Piscitelli as Ben


Production

Starting in June 2008, the independently-financed film began
principal photography Principal photography is the phase of producing a film or television show in which the bulk of shooting takes place, as distinct from the phases of pre-production and post-production. Personnel Besides the main film personnel, such as actor ...
in
Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...
. It was the first English-language feature financed by
KRU Studios KRU Studios is a Malaysian media and entertainment company. Founded in 1992, KRU Studios has since diversified and now provides a range of services related to the media and entertainment industry, specialising in both production and distributio ...
, and was originally scheduled for a mid-2009 release. KRU handled
post-production Post-production is part of the process of filmmaking, video production, audio production, and photography. Post-production includes all stages of production occurring after principal photography or recording individual program segments. The ...
,
visual effects Visual effects (sometimes abbreviated VFX) is the process by which imagery is created or manipulated outside the context of a live-action shot in filmmaking and video production. The integration of live-action footage and other live-action foota ...
and distribution in Asia.


Release

The film premiered to DVD in the United Kingdom on October 5, 2009, and in the United States on December 1, 2009.Release dates
from IMDB
After Murphy's death on December 20, 2009,
Redbox Redbox Automated Retail LLC (stylized as redbox.) is an American video rental company specializing in DVD, Blu-ray, 4K UHD rentals, and formerly video games via automated retail kiosks. Redbox kiosks feature the company's signature red color an ...
recalled film posters which were displayed on kiosks around the country. The poster depicted Murphy's character sitting in bathtub with a dead version of the other female lead character's reflection in the mirror.


Reception

In her review for Film Thrills, Deirdre Crimmins said that "the script is awful. Not only is the dialogue awkward and unnatural, and the plot impossible to follow, but there is no character development and all of the characters act irrationally."


Soundtrack

MovieScore Media MovieScore Media is a Swedish record label devoted to original film scores, founded in 2005 by former film music journalist Mikael Carlsson. The label has produced over 500 soundtrack albums, focusing primarily on scores composed by up and coming ...
released Carlos José Alvarez's score for the film on July 27, 2010. The album was dedicated to
Brittany Murphy Brittany Anne Murphy-Monjack (; November 10, 1977 – December 20, 2009) was an American actress and singer. Born in Atlanta, Murphy moved to Los Angeles as a teenager and pursued a career in acting. Her breakthrough role was as Tai Fras ...
's memory. # Main Titles 2:06 # Lucy and David 1:10 # Somebody Died Here 3:05 # The House 1:51 # First Morning 1:07 # Haunted Piano :51 # Taking a Bath 1:13 # An Attempt to Escape 2:24 # Medication 1:52 # Transformation 2:27 # What If Ben Finds Out 1:33 # But I Belong to You 2:08 # Miscarriage 2:21 # The Drowning 5:00 # The Burial 3:44 # Following Lucy 1:03 # Burial Site 4:02 # Lucy Saves Alice 2:16 # Set Free 1:25 # Deadline (Suite for Orchestra) 6:01


References


External links

*
Exclusive: First Five Minutes of ''Deadline'', Starring Brittany Murphy
from filmschoolrejects.com * {{DEFAULTSORT:Deadline 2009 direct-to-video films 2009 horror films 2000s thriller films American horror thriller films Films shot in Louisiana American ghost films 2009 films 2009 directorial debut films 2000s English-language films 2000s American films