Anchor Bay Entertainment Canada

7 Minutes Canada Theatrical / VOD Release – June 26, 2015

Page Break Report June 29, 2015

 

 Monday, June 22  

Outlet: SiriusXM Canada Talks Format: Satellite Radio Interviewer: Ward Anderson, Alison Dore    

  Outlet: Examiner Format: Online Interviewer: Dave Voigt        

                                                   

Jason Ritter Interview Schedule  

                                                                                           

Interviews

                                                                              Please find this interview online below: https://www.dropbox.com/s/8uwlb8m4dhpyxyu/Ward%20%26%20Al%20-%207%20Minutes%20-%20Jason%20Ritter.mp3?dl=0

Channel 167

                                                                         It's hard to keep up given how many different distinct platforms are out there for movies to get delivered on. Opening for a limited run, exclusively at the Carlton cinema here in downtown Toronto and nationwide on various on demand platforms, "7 Minutes" is the gripping tale of three young men with nowhere left to turn in a bank heist gone horribly, horribly wrong.

I got the chance to sit down with co-star Jason Ritter to see what attracted him to the material and the challenges of a working actor to balance the jobs that you are passionate about against the one's that pay the bills    Dave Voigt: I got a genuine emotional thrill out of the movie because it is a tale that is chronicling the death of the idyllic small town American dream. What was it that ultimately attracted you to this project? Jason Ritter: Well a bunch of things, but that dynamic that you described was part of it for sure. To follow these guys who were at one point a big deal but now are down and out. Especially for Luke Mitchell's character Sam and if he hadn't have blown out his knee while playing football, he'd still be at college or even have a chance at the pros and a better life. But now he loses his job and he's desperate. The fact that it isn't three guys who are ensconced in a life of crime and just guys who are in way over their heads is what really attracted me to the project. All of these characters were just interesting and real. The other aspect that I really liked about this story was how our writer/director Jay Martin was telling the story. With the narrative jumping back and forth in time, we get some little hints on what is going to happen but we don't learn everything that is going to happen with these three guys and I knew it was keep the audience on edge, just a little bit as it all unfolded. It allows the audience to feel sorry for them when we know that this master plan that they have will go horribly wrong and even grimly hopeful for these characters as well when more of the story unfolds and I really enjoyed that rollercoaster of storytelling, I found it really engaging. DV: You seem to be the kind of actor that balances the smaller projects like 7 Minutes and About Alex that you've been in against doing the runs on a hit show like Parenthood and being a player on a larger set every day. Do these smaller films allow you more creativity or even room to breathe as an actor.

JR: Oh for sure, I mean at least for me it does. A lot of times on the bigger budget projects they are kind of looking for you to fit into a mould of something that they have seen you do before because the investment is bigger and they don't necessarily want to take any huge leaps. But with Independent Film, everyone involved (even the people putting up the money) are there because they want to support the directors vision. They are all coming together because they like and believe in this story that he is trying to tell. The risk taking in Independent Film is almost mandatory because there just isn't the time to do things any other way. There's no money for months of rehearsal or shooting things at all kinds of different angles, I mean you basically just have a conversation with the director about where you think the character and then you show up on set without any concerns about the financials of the situation and let be more about the artistry of it all. However conversely, I feel very lucky that on Parenthood it felt like more of a movie set then any TV set I had ever worked on as they were always very interested in the actor's input and they gave us some freedom to improvise. In many ways there are some positives that can translate over on both sides of the aisle and it varies from project to project. Guys have learned a lot from film going into to TV and vice versa. DV: Is that the ultimate balancing act for an actor? To be able to find those roles where you can experiment and take some chances versus the ones we all have to take to pay the bills and keep the lights on? JR: Oh most definitely. I mean obviously you'd love to only be able to do things that you are passionate about but that will always be a factor. I've also been lucky enough to be able to do television the past couple of years where I have been earning a decent wage but am also 100% behind creatively and it's nice because obviously with sponsorship and the like, but doing movies has become a little bit more like the Wild West because of the internet and so many other factors. I find it important just to take responsibility for the choices that I make professionally both good and bad.

I mean there are so many actors that I have admired over the years who have only done these brilliant movies, but that was then and this is now. DV: Do you have a preference in genre or medium that you work in? You have family backgrounds in comedy and you have extensive training but looking at your CV it almost seems like you've tried to do as many different types of things as possible? JR: Wow, that's a tough question but I think that it really all comes down the common denominator of if I connect to the material. I tend to gravitate towards things that have a blend of comedy and drama, because I mean that is what life is all about and even if it skews more in one direction then it does the other, if I understand and have a grasp on the mold that the character has to be in then I can jump in no matter what. However, I'll admit that working on The Event, something in more of an action vein was a hell of a lot of fun for me because I grew up simply loving those kinds of movies. DV: Is there an ultimate goal for you going forward or is it really just about making sure you are in the right position for the right material to come across your desk? JR: You know the more I do this job, the more it really is about the latter, just having the flexibility to wait for the material. It's dangerous for me to hold myself up to someone else, because then if I don't get there I get down on myself. I mean I have my general goals just about being to work on the level that I am right now, if any of the other stuff comes , that would be great, but if it doesn't then that is OK too.              Please find this interview online below: http://www.examiner.com/article/jason-ritter-talks-7-minutes-and-more-for-more-then-7-minutes

                                                                                           

Reviews    

         

             

                                                                   

Outlet: NOW Magazine Reviewer: Norm Wilner Review: Negative Rating: 2Ns / 5Ns

 7 Minutes jumps back and forth in time between a botched robbery and the circumstances that lead three desperate friends (Luke Mitchell, Jason Ritter, Zane Holtz) to plan their criminal act. Writer/director Jay Martin does what he can to establish the stakes, surrounding his luckless heroes with thugs and skells who are far worse than they are. The script also takes side trips into the histories of other characters to show us that virtually everyone is up against some kind of wall. As Mitchell’s pregnant girlfriend, Leven Rambin does a great job of playing someone who’s really tired of listening to her partner’s bluster. But all the chronological hopscotch can’t paper over the fact that Martin just doesn’t have that much of a story to tell. He strains to come up with new wrinkles and twists to the generic thriller plot. 84 minutes.                             Please find this review online below: https://nowtoronto.com/movies/reviews/7-minutes/

               

         

Reel Brief: Mini reviews of The Great Museum, 7 Minutes, Eden, The Overnight and The Little Death  By: Linda Barnard Staff Reporter, Entertainment  Published on Thu Jun 25 2015                                            

Outlet: Toronto Star Reviewer: Linda Barnard Review: Positive Rating: 3 Stars / 4 Stars

Starring Luke Mitchell, Jason Ritter, Zane Holtz and Leven Rambin. Written and directed by Jay Martin. 84 minutes. Opening Friday at the Carlton, VOD same day. 14A   Writer-director Jay Martin’s 7 Minutes puts an

entertaining spin on the heist movie with a fast-moving drama that flits from past to present during a bank job. Taking its title from the robbers’ plan, “seven minutes and out” to get the cash and make a getaway, Martin gives us plenty of reasons to care about small-town brothers Sam (Luke Mitchell, the best performance of the three), Mike (Jason Ritter) and their high school buddy, Owen (Zane Holtz). Sam, the football hero sidelined by an injury, is now unemployed with a baby on the way with high school sweetheart Kate (Leven Rambin). Mike is a low-level pot dealer scrambling for cash and Owen, recently out of jail and broke, thinks they can score big with the help of a pill dealer. When everything goes wrong, robbery seems a quick solution, with Martin opening the movie with the bank job and drawing ever-tightening circles to tease out the plot. Double crosses and dirty dealings keep things interesting. And look for Kris Kristofferson as Owen’s dad, who knows the best policy about crime is to not get caught. A solid score and tight camerawork shows Martin’s background as a music video director translates well to big-screen work.       Please find this review online below: http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/movies/2015/06/25/reel-brief-mini-reviews-of-the-great-museum-7-minutes-eden-the-overnight-and-the-little-death.html  

   

             

                                                                     

Outlet: National Post Reviewer: David Berry Review: Negative Rating: 1 Star / 4 Stars

From its poorly thought out pop-philosophy monologues to its weightlessly bloody violence to its eminently predictable flashback structure, Seven Minutes feels like a movie Jay Martin has had rolling around in his head since he saw his first Tarantino. It should never have escaped the frontal lobe: Martin is most thoroughly no Tarantino.   A storyboard artist/music video director, Martin has some sense of how to tell a story visually, in the sense that he lays everything out in the most unremittingly obvious way possible; as for his actual writing, well, its obvious his strength is in pictures. Following three high school friends (Leven Rambin, Luke Mitchell, Jason Ritter) who get in serious debt to a drug dealer and rob a bank to try to make amends, 7 Minutes is essentially Yahtzee with crime movie trope dice, with Martin stuck matching ones and twos.    There isn’t a character here, from a psychopathic bruiser with a shotgun to a nerdy overweight cop to the flatly unappealing main trio, who doesn’t feel like a low-res scan of a shaky photocopy of a faded polaroid of a character in a

better crime drama, none of which is helped by a plot that’s too simple to generate tension even from its narrative tricks. It’s glossy enough to look good on a big screen, but in every other way it looks like something that should be viewed on the iPhones of the teenage minds that brought it to life over one crazy weekend. 7 Minutes opens June 26 in Toronto and on VOD                                               Please find this review online below: http://news.nationalpost.com/arts/movies/7-minutes-review-no-tarantino  Please find this review reposted online below:      http://www.ottawacitizen.com/entertainment/Minutes+review+Tarantino/11166097/story.html

         

           

                                               

hree friends, Sam (Luke Mitchell), Mike (Jason Ritter) and Owen (Zane Holtz) are stuck in a small, middle of nowhere town. When they get into financial trouble, they resort to robbery of a local bank. The plan was simple: in and out in 7

. minutes. Director Jay Martin desperately wants 7 Minutes to be a gritty, cutting edge thriller and tries very, very hard to achieve this goal.

Outlet: Toronto Film Scene Reviewer: Amanda Clarke Review: Negative

Unfortunately, Martin, who also wrote the script, has nothing original to say and his “innovations” with the back and forward narrative have been done before and better. There are multiple onscreen deaths, beatings and other violent doings throughout the film, but there is a complete lack of energy or commitment from anyone involved. The three leads are generic at best and have the collective onscreen presence of a sack of potatoes. They look nothing alike, and yet it’s difficult to tell one from the other. The structure of the film doesn’t help. 7 Minutes is told in multiple flashbacks, each focusing on individual characters as the clock counts down the planned minutes of the robbery. This is an attempt to create suspense, but instead just makes the film drag as the flashbacks just confirm that everything is exactly as you expected it to be. There’s no mystery to any of it due to the completely pedestrian nature of the story. Anyone who has ever seen a heist film can piece together the entire story inside the first half hour of the ninety minute run time. This wouldn’t be such a problem if the characters were engaging or the film’s structure wasn’t trying too hard, but alas, neither is true. In the end, 7 Minutes is supposed to be a thriller, but it just drags. It relies on the tired tropes of the search for the American dream, using woman as leverage and the good guy who resorts to desperate measures for his family. It’s trying to be smarter than it is, but as a result, the problems stand out like a glowing neon sign. IS 7 MINUTES OPENING WEEKEND WORTHY? No. You’ve seen this film before done much, much better. Take the time you would spend watching 7 Minutes revisiting classics like Dog Day Afternoon instead. 7 Minutes screens Friday, June 26, 2015 at 9:00 pm at Carlton Cinema. Check their website for more information. Please find this review online below: http://thetfs.ca/2015/06/26/review-7-minutes/