Nicholas Pinnock (“For Life”) will play world heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali in “A God Amongst Men.”
The film, co-written and to be directed by James Newton (“2:Hrs”), also stars Christopher Eccleston (“Dodger”), and is based on the true story of Ali’s visit to Tyneside, U.K., in 1977. The film is co-written by Ian Skelton (“Hey Duggee”).
Newton said: ” ‘A God Amongst Men’ is based upon the true story of how one man, Johnny Walker, outrageously claimed that he would bring Muhammad Ali to Tyneside in 1977 to save a boxing club from closure. Johnny was instantly ridiculed and he became a laughing stock. But Johnny didn’t give up on his dream. He found the people to help make the impossible possible.”
The film is produced by Adam Rolston and David Braithwaite for Studio Pictures (“A Street Cat Named Bob”) with Bob Clarke (“Boiling Point”) and Picnik Entertainment’s Nicola Pearcey (“A Girl Can Touch the Sky”) serving as executive producers.
Pre-production will start in August and filming will wrap by the end of the year.
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In order to engage their audience early, Studio Pictures is releasing an exclusive NFT art drop at the end of July. Collaborating with a leading British comic artist, 11 hand-drawn cartoon characters based on real-life working-class kids from the film called “The Skidz” — an abbreviation of boxing club Shields Park Kids — will be created. Each NFT minted will have a unique physical perk attributed to it linked to the film production – the chance to visit the set, limited edition merchandise, or attending the cast and crew screening.
“The potential for NFTs to completely change the landscape of film marketing is here. It’s here now. Filmmakers need to wake up to the seismic shift that has been happening with NFT assets over the last year. NFTs are game-changing for indie filmmakers. We can now build a community and an audience for our film before we have shot a single frame and that same audience will be part of our journey from day one,” Newton said.
Samahoma Media Advisors has secured funding for the creation of the NFT collection through Insight Media Fund in their first NFT initiative.
Samahoma CEO Bob Clarke added: “Properly planned and executed, with strong creativity harnessing their potential for connectivity, NFTs offer multiple ways to elevate the relationship between super-fan audiences and the music, movies, new literature and other arts and entertainment they love. James Newton has understood that and as a result we were happy to source the finance he needed to create the collection.”
Samahoma has identified three other music and literature IPs with similar potential for support later in the year.
