Ben Leon's Manhattan

We are having a heat wave here in California--too hot to do anything, Fortunately, we were not shooting this weekend. Our sound stages are on the top floor of our office building, so it really heats up when the weather is hot. Add to that ten or twenty thousand watts of lights and you get a real broiler!

We released Ben Leon's Manhattan on Friday--its a great movie (coming in at 3 hours long!) that Ben shot in New York. It is his first time out on his own as a director (he has helped me direct for the past year, most notably in Manifesto where we shared credit). Manhattan, however, is the first full-on Ben Leon movie. He set out to make a high quality picture that had a very different feel from the regular RSS stuff. He cast younger, urban--even more thugish--guys. Manuel Torres leads the picture and is on the box cover.

My thoughts on this movie are pretty strong--I think it is one of the best movies of the year! The quality of the project, from start to finish, is first rate, and Ben really blasts onto the scene as a stand-out director. He will become one of our industry's leaders very quickly.

Thank goodness he is my employee!!!!