Vine Alternative Investments, which earlier this month acquired controlling interest in Village Roadshow, has acquired Manchester Library Company. The deal is for the library’s 30-title slate that includes Oscar-nominated The Fighter starring Mark Wahlberg, Limitless, Immortals, Dear John and more. The catalog also…

Paul Tamasy and Eric Johnson, the scribes behind the Boston-based hero tale The Fighter and the currently shooting The Finest Hours, tell me after their newly minted CAA reps sold to Fox their feature script Boston Strong that director Daniel Espinosa plans to have his cameras filming at the Boston Marathon next…

EXCLUSIVE: Screenwriters Eric Johnson and Paul Tamasy have picked up feature rights to Boston Strong, I’ve learned. The forthcoming book by Casey Sherman and Boston Herald reporter Dave Wedge examines the city's reaction to the fatal April 15 Patriots' Day attacks at the Boston Marathon finsh line and the hunt for the…

EXCLUSIVE: Mark Wahlberg‘s Oscar-nominated feature The Fighter is the inspiration for a docu reality series. Wahlberg executive produces the half-hour project, which has received a pilot order from A&E. Inspired by the scene-stealing, big-haired, loud-talking, punch-throwing sisters of Wahlberg’s Micky Ward and…

EXCLUSIVE: CAA has signed Melissa Leo, the reigning Best Supporting Actress winner for The Fighter. Leo had been repped by ICM. Leo was best known for her work on the NBC drama Homicide until she caught feature momentum first with Frozen River, which won her the Best Actress Independent Spirit Award and got her an…

Oscar contenders The King’s Speech, The Fighter and 127 Hours will face off again, this time as finalists in the feature film category for this year’s Humanitas Prizes, which recognize writers whose work “entertain, engage and enrich the viewing public.” The series finale of DirecTV’s Friday Night Lights made the cut…

So tonight’s Academy Awards scorecard for independent films were 7 major Oscars, including the 19th Best Picture of the past 30 years for non-studio movies. The Independent Film & Television Alliance compiled this list: Best Picture: The King’s Speech (The Weinstein Co);  Best Director: Tom Hooper – The King’s Speech…

Get those ballots in, stragglers. Forget that many professional pundits and even casual observers of this year's Oscar race have already called it. (…The King's Speech wins Best Picture… Best Actor for Colin Firth… Natalie Portman gets Best Actress… The Fighter‘s Christian Bale and Melissa Leo win supporting… The Socia…

The Deadline Team of Nikki Finke, Pete Hammond, and Mike Fleming have spent recent days interviewing the studio moguls to gauge their perspective on this very close Oscar race: RELATIVITY 7 Nominations: 7 The Fighter DEADLINE’s Nikki Finke: How did you first get involved with The Fighter? RYAN KAVANAUGH: Mark Wahlberg…

The Deadline Team of Nikki Finke, Pete Hammond, and Mike Fleming have spent recent days interviewing the studio moguls to gauge their perspective on this very close Oscar race: PARAMOUNT 20 Nominations: 10 True Grit, 7 The Fighter, 2 How To Train Your Dragon, 1 Iron Man DEADLINE’s Nikki Finke: You had the most Oscar n…

With ballots out and not due back until 5 PM on February 22nd, I decided to talk to a sampling of Academy Of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences voters directly to see how they’re picking their winners. By doing this very unscientific survey in the past, I could gauge if an upset was coming. For instance, in 1992, I found…

Apparently she wasn’t content to let the Paramount and Relativity marketing machine do all the campaign work. So Best Supporting Actress frontrunner Melissa Leo personally paid for Hollywood trade ads (including on Deadline.com) Thursday showing  her super glammed-up wearing "Faux (not real) Fur" and a glittery…