Freeman, Pacino, Mirren and DeVito, together in ‘Sniff’

Morgan Freeman, Al Pacino, Helen Mirren and Danny DeVito will star in ‘Sniff’, a poker of aces that has been put on the table by director and producer Taylor Hackford that according to the filmmaker will be an elegant reinvention of the noir genre.

The plot of ‘Sniff’ will present how two residents die in suspicious circumstances in a luxurious retirement community. Retired detective Joe Mulwray (Morgan Freeman) returns to action thanks to his former partner William Keys (Dany DeVito) and they discover a hidden underworld of sex, drugs and murder in the rich community controlled by drug lord Harvey Stride (Al Pacino) and his right hand and femme fatale, The Spider (Hellen Mirren). Adam Goodman and Matt Skiena will produce through Dichotomy Creative Group, along with Hackford through Anvil Films. Gray will serve as executive producer. Endeavor Content will open world sales at TIFF.

Speaking to the Deadline portal, Goodman has revealed the approximate release date of the film. “My dream is to have the movie by the fourth quarter of 2022. Adult audiences are very underserved right now, and there seems to be a great opportunity. This movie can be screened widely, but it can be a great event for that community. ” The filming of ‘Sniff’ is scheduled to start in early 2022.

“I’ve always been a big fan of film noir, but I haven’t actually made a movie, although I did ‘Against All Risks'”, commented Taylor Hackford, who signed hits such as ‘Officer and a Gentleman’ or ‘Proof of Life’ , who explained how the project came about: “It was when I proposed making a new version of ‘Return to the Past’, which is one of the best noir films in history. I didn’t want to do a scene-by-scene remake, but I took that as inspiration. Adam and Matt Skiena sent the script to my agent and I was delighted. A rookie screenwriter who has an amazing style and conceptually understands what makes film noir stick. ”

“The whole concept of establishing film noir in a senior retirement community… They are proliferating across America as the baby boom generation retires. There is a lot of money and people want to live in a beautiful environment. That’s what appears in the brochures, but what Tom Gray did was show what lay beneath the surface. I thought it was a brilliant idea and he understood the nature of the good noir, the dark history, the incredibly twisted characters, and I thought he had a great handle, “added Hackford.

According to the director, the screenwriter wrote the film with the actors in mind. “Morgan Freeman as the detective at the end of his career; the main nemesis will be Al Pacino, the fatal woman will be Helen Mirren, an actress I know quite well, “joked Hackford, who is married to the interpreter. «I said to him: Who will be the ex-partner? Danny DeVito answered. They are all people I know. I have worked with Al, Helen, Danny is a friend, I already know Morgan, and he has always been looking for something to do with Helen, “he said.

“When I did ‘Deal with the Devil’ with Pacino, I had rejected him four times before. And Tony Gilroy and I keep changing and adding scenes. He is not an easy actor. It was a new version of that ‘Pactar con el diablo’ experience. We gave it to Al and he said, I don’t know if it’s for me. I kept insisting: Al, it’s for you. And we keep making changes. And now Al thinks he has the best role in the movie »has commented Hackford, for whom Danny de Vito« is a very good director and a wonderful actor, none of these people are easy, but I think the idea that everyone is useful collaborating together is going to be delicious. And everyone has a role to match their talent, “said the director the filmmaker.

With ‘Sniff’ Hackford intends to push the noir genre in the same way that ‘Daggers in the Back’ pushed the ‘whodunit’: ‘I loved what Rian Johnson did by taking an old genre, the detective novel, and bringing it to life in a contemporary situation. That’s what I have in mind for ‘Sniff’ with film noir, “he says. “There will be laughs and smiles in the movie, but as it goes on, it gets darker and darker, and it’s worth it. If you are using film noir and it does not give results in a very climatic way, it becomes a euphemistic use of that twist, and this will not be the case “, he has advanced.