News

Mike Gabrawy has been named head of production for Arclight Films.

Based in Los Angeles and reporting to managing director Gary Hamilton, he will oversee a slate of eight to 10 in-house productions per year, including international productions.

Gabrawy previously served as a production exec at Constantin Film, where he was responsible for acquiring and developing the Sony PlayStation game "Resident Evil" for film. He also had a hand in developing the "Fantastic Four" movies.

His credits as producer include "All You Need," "Stealing Time" and the documentary "Running With Arnold."

At Arclight, he will be involved with the film adaptation of Top Cow comic book property "Witchblade" with Platinum Studios, to be directed by Michael Rymer; Stan Winston's last creature creation, "Speed Demon"; and Kaare Andrews supernatural thriller "Altitude."...

• His popularity has come in three distinctive chapters - World Champion bodybuilder, Hollywood actor and as the Governor of state of California. He has been a source of documentary interest since Pumping Iron and Variety reports that the SXSW Film Festival doc will see the limelight in select theaters and a DVD launch in 08 via an agreement between Red Envelope Entertainment and Lantern Lane Ent.Narrated by Alec Baldwin, Dan Cox's  Running With Arnold chronicles Schwarzenegger's rise to celebrity and political power. Written and directed by former Variety journalist Cox, the doc was produced by Gabrawy and attorney Jennifer Hughes and exec produced by Endless World's Gregg Michael Abrams and Jeffrey Orenstein of Purple Princess Prods. ...

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Actor Alec Baldwin has pulled out of an upcoming documentary charting California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's rise to political power, because of its Nazi undertones. The Pearl Harbor star claims he agreed to narrate the film, titled Running With Arnold, before learning his script would be accompanied by images of Nazi rallies and the Nazi party paperwork of Schwarzenegger's father. Now he's demanding his voice be removed from the project and has ordered his attorney to issue a cease-and-desist demand against the filmmakers. In a posting on The Huffington Post website he writes, "The film-makers hammer Schwarzenegger over his private behaviour and his record as governor. But Schwarzenegger deserves to be treated fairly and the film's images of Nazi rallies were over the line." However, producers insist Baldwin had plenty of opportunities to view footage before recording his part and deny the project is biased against the Republican governor. Mike Gabrawy says, "What's really shocking about this situation is that this is not really a critical look at Arnold - there's a lot more we could've done to be critical." Some images of the Third Reich have been replaced.