The Solution Entertainment Group is currently offering a handful of projects at the ongoing Toronto International Film Festival, one of the more promising of which is Felony, a Joel Edgerton-scripted thriller to be directed by Matthew Saville. Edgerton is also set to star in the film, as a highly respected police officer who collides his way into a moral dilemma. And we’ve just gotten word, via press release, that Tom Wilkinson has signed on to join the project.
Lately, it’s been a quiet time for Wilkinson, save for the fact that he was the best part of the otherwise lackluster Best Exotic Marigold Hotel. But his assignment here — Detective Carl Summer, the investigating officer of a driving accident that Edgerton‘s character is very intimately involved with — sounds like it could ignite those aggressive, on-edge sparks we’ve been craving. (It’s been a whole two-and-a-half-years since his terrific one-scene Ghost Writer contribution, and I’m an impatient guy.)
The film’s director, Saville, has no shortage of small-screen experience under his belt, having worked on a dozen or so television series in his native Australia. In feature-length terms, however, he’s only directed a single film: 2007’s Noise. I haven’t seen the film myself, but it was nominated for a number of Australian Film Institute awards, and it’s readily available, at the moment, on Netflix Instant. Might be worth a look one of these days.
Filming on Felony is slated to begin in late October, and hopefully the ensuing process — as well as the more financial one happening right now in Toronto — goes smoothly, because it does sound like there’s a wealth of potential here. Now that he’s a major movie-star, a lot of people forget that Edgerton‘s roots are very much in the written word — he co-wrote his brother Nash‘s feature debut, 2008’s The Square — and chances are good that’s he come up with something interesting here.
Here’s the slightly updated synopsis in full:
Driving home after a celebration drink with his team after the long waited bust of a major gang, a decorated police officer (Edgerton) runs a young cyclist off the road. As he gives CPR to the child, fellow officers arrive to take his statement. In a split second decision he tells them a lie about the accident which will change all their lives in this edge of your seat thriller.
What do you think of the pairing of Edgerton and Wilkinson?