Matt Damons recalls the financing troubles his team faced with new movie Lone Survivor.
Matt Damon didn't want to make Lone Survivor a "political" film.The actor and filmmaker handled foreign sales for the project for financier Envision Entertainment through his company Foresight Unlimited. He told Variety even with Mark Wahlberg attached to star in the story of Navy SEAL Marcus Luttrell, and Peter Berg at the helm to direct, getting funding wasn't easy.He credits the director's unforgettable pitch at the Cannes Film Festival with helping the project see the light of day."At first glance, it seemed like a jingoist film that would probably not win any Oscars, but Peter did a great job at Cannes and then made a great film -- much more than we were expecting," Matt told the trade publication, noting producers were adamant about staying true to their original vision. "We didn't want to make a political film," he said. The movie, based on Marcus Luttrell's 2005 book Lone Survivor: The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of SEAL Team 10, tells the author's story as the sole survivor of a failed reconnaissance mission on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border in 2005.Envision Entertainment CFO Stephan Martirosyan admitted getting interest from foreign buyers was no small task."We knew that getting presales from the Europeans that this was not going to be easy," the executive said. "It's just not the kind of story that the Europeans care a lot about."Eventually, Matt's firm prevailed and sold the film to 40 markets, according to the outlet. Universal will debut the film on Christmas Day in two US cinemas.It will expand to theatres in France, the UK, Spain, and throughout the US next month.
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