Director/writer Richard Yelland is joining Happy Ending, the production company founded earlier this year by executive producer Steven Shore and director Jonathan David. Yelland comes over from Dictionary Films.
Yelland’s critically acclaimed film Floating: the Nathan Gocke Story, produced by Oscar-nominee, Morgan Spurlock (Super Size Me), won “Best Documentary” at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival’s American Pavilion Emerging Filmmaker Showcase. Floating was also a “Best Documentary” winner at the 2010 New York City Short Film Festival and is currently airing nationally on FUEL TV. The film chronicles the story of a man who becomes a paraplegic after a surfing accident and then perseveres through rehab to again surf.
Yelland has become known as a filmmaker who explores the extremes of action sports and human storytelling with a smart hint of comedy. Real people, powerful visuals and great performances are a trademark of his directorial work on projects for Fox Sports, Fuel TV and the Ford Motor Company, among others. Yelland received an Emmy nomination in the national public service category for “Pool,” a PSA he wrote and directed for the Life Rolls On Foundation, a nonprofit organization that serves as a grass-roots resource and advocate for young people who have sustained spinal cord injuries. “Pool” centers on Darwin Holmes, a wheelchair-bound athlete who finds himself poolside, staring–one imagines, into the water below–and contemplating his physical limitations. Shockingly, Holmes rolls his chair over the edge and into the swimming pool, which turns out to be empty. Holmes then “skates” all over the pool in his wheelchair, offering an extreme sports-like exhibition. A supered word “disabled” turns to “able” as he passes by. Yelland directed “Pool” when he was at Right Brain Media.
Yelland started his career as an agency creative in New York. His agency pedigree includes his serving as a copywriter at J. Walter Thompson and Kirshenbaum Bond + Partners (now Kirsehenbaum Bond Senecal + Partners), both in New York. His writing spanned such brands as Eastman Kodak, Coca-Cola, and Procter & Gamble.
As a spot director, he gained initial recognition in SHOOT‘s “The Best Work You May Never See” gallery for Gold Gym’s “Serious Fitness,” a comedy commercial that opens on a man who wakes up and drowsily walks from his bedroom to the hallway. Strangely the bedroom door is unhinged. He then takes a shower–but the shower stall door is missing. Next he heats up a cup of coffee in the kitchen microwave. The microwave door is gone. He’s then seated at the kitchen table eating breakfast when a newspaper flies into the picture and hits him in the head. A missing kitchen door cleared the path for the delivery boy to airmail the paper directly at the man. Finally we see the guy running a quick errand. He reaches to open the swinging door of a sidewalk mailbox–and effortlessly pulls the little door straight off its hinges. A closing super of the Gold Gym’s logo appears on screen, accompanied by the slogan, “Serious Fitness.”
“Captain America: Brave New World” Tops Weak Weekend At The Box Office
"Captain America: Brave New World" kept falling but still hovered above all others at a weak weekend box office.
The latest Disney-Marvel offering brought in another $15 million according to studio estimates Sunday, when most of Hollywood's attention was on the Oscars.
The Anthony Mackie-led "Captain America: Brave New World" opened strong at about $120 million on a three-day weekend last month, but plunged to $28.2 million last week in one of the most significant second-week drops for a Marvel movie. It's earned $163.7 since its release.
It was slammed by many critics and audiences, failing to bring the Marvel reset some had hoped for. That task now falls to May's "Thunderbolts" and July's "Fantastic Four: First Steps." But "Captain America" will face little competition through March, and could remain at No. 1 for a while.
The weekend's only significant new release, Focus Features' "Last Breath," earned just $7.8 million. The based-on-a-true-story adventure starring Woody Harrelson, Simi Liu and Chris Lemons is about a routine deep-sea diving mission that goes terribly wrong when a young diver is stranded some 300 feet below the surface.
It got strong reviews, with Lindsey Bahr of The Associated Press praising the "white-knuckle experience" and "pure suspense and anxiety" it brings.
At No. 3 was Oz Perkins' "The Monkey," which brought in $6.4 million for a two-week total of $24.6 million. It's among the strongest openings for indie distributor Neon, whose film "Anora," and its director Sean Baker could make a major mark at the Oscars later Sunday.
"The Monkey" marks another successful low-budget collaboration between Perkins and Neon, whose "Longlegs" brought in $126.9 million globally last year.
"Paddington... Read More