Roadside Picks Up 'I Love You, Phillip Morris'

Offhandedly, we mentioned last weekend that Jim Carrey's I Love You, Phillip Morris would never be released in the US. Two reasons for that, really. The first is because the film was shot back in mid-2008 and it has already come and gone all over the world. An ancillary part of the first reason is that the movie didn't make a lot of noise overseas, so why would a US distributor bend over backwards for it? The second reason, a bigger factor, is that the film was embroiled in a lawsuit involving the distributors that had the film slotted for April of this year and then moved it to June. Suddenly, a movie that sat around for a while, got dropped from its initial Valentine's Day opening before the two other delays, was in danger of never making it to theaters in this country. But the lawsuit's over, and the film has a new distributor, the suddenly active Roadside Attractions. Not exactly Fox or Warners, but anything's better than nothing at this point. And for Roadside, it's just whatever distribution and possible P & A fees it will incur; the production cost - an estimated $60 million - is someone else's problem. Roadside just announced it would handle the US release of Biutiful with Javier Bardem, and the baby brand has had good luck with Winter's Bone in limited release. For Phillip Morris, Roadside has announced a December 3rd opening for the long-shelved gay prison romantic dark comedy with Carrey and Ewan McGregor. Fourth quarter tax write-off? Shrewd counterprogramming? Good bargain? It could be any number of these, but I doubt it will be a big success, and as the distributor enters the awards season with the very legitimate Biutiful, it's likely this one won't get a lo