Producer Pam Collis has joined forces with Los Angeles-based Aussie actress/writer Amanda Dow to produce Intrepid, the saga of two women’s journey through life after cancer.
Dow has written the script with US actress/writer Emily Sandifer and the two plan to play the co-leads. Collis and Dow will pitch the project to international buyers at next week’s American Film Market, where they aim to land a foreign sales agent.
Dow will play Hannah, a wealthy chief financial officer and devoted mother and wife who has breast cancer. She struggles to save her marriage while raising her rebellious 13-year-old daughter,
Sandifer is Tyler, a photographer and loner who is in remission from ovarian cancer. She tries desperately to win back her soul mate Jake, with whom she broke up without telling him she had cancer because she didn’t want him to miss out on having a family.
Their friendship blossoms after meeting in a cancer support group. Tony Bonner is attached to play Hank, the local hotelier who befriends the women and becomes a father figure for Tyler.
Collis, the principal of Silver Wings Films, tells IF all the other roles are yet to be cast. She and Dow have a directors "wish list" and they hope to attach a director by the end of the AFM.
Pam and Amanda met when they both worked on director John V Soto’s thriller The Reckoning in Perth earlier this year. Collis was the line producer and Amanda played a supporting character.
“I was looking for an independent project that inspired strength and passion in women,” says Collis about Intrepid. "While this is really a passion project for us we are realistic and would rather make compromises so it doesn’t remain a perfect script in the attic."
Collis produced the comedic heist thriller Drive Hard, directed by Brian Trenchard-Smith, starring John Cusack and Thomas Jane, which was filmed on the Gold Coast in June.
The plan is to shoot Intrepid in Australia next year, probably on the Gold Coast. Collis is also producing with Trevor Howis’ Vincero Productions Weekend Warriors, an action thriller to be directed by Antony Szeto.