Cannes: Tom Cruise’s ‘Mena’ Draws Financing from New Hercules Film Fund
Producers Paris Kasidokostas Latsis and Terry Dougas have formed Hercules Film Fund and come on board to co-finance Tom Cruise’s drug trade thriller “Mena,” directed by Doug Liman.
Kasidokostas Latsis has set up the Luxembourg-based Hercules Film Fund to bring European investors to finance three to five wide release films per year, while Dougas has formed production banner Rhea Films as the producing vehicle for films financed by Hercules.
“Mena” will be co-financed by Hercules and co-produced by Rhea Films with Kasidokostas Latsis, Dougas and Jean-Luc De Fanti as executive producers. Production companies are Imagine, Quadrant Pictures and Cross Creek Pictures.
Shooting began Tuesday in Atlanta. Brian Grazer will produce for his Imagine Entertainment along with Cross Creek’s Brian Oliver and Tyler Thompson as well as Doug Davidson.
“Mena,” based on the spec script by Gary Spinelli, follows a TWA pilot recruited by the CIA to provide reconnaissance on the burgeoning communist threat in Central America in the 1980s, and finds himself in charge of one of the biggest covert CIA operations
Joe Cohen served as an advisor to the creation of the fund and Sky Moore served as legal counsel.
Hercules and Rhea Films will operate independently from 1821 Media, the production and finance company owned by Kasidokostas Latsis and Dougas. 1821 Media is backing “The Odyssey” for Warner Bros., which David Heyman is producing It’s in post-production on Gavin O’Connor’s “Jane Got A Gun,” starring Natalie Portman for Relativity and TWC, and Paul Weitz’s “Grandma,” starring Lily Tomlin for Sony Classics.
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