Vancouver: Gynormous Pictures producer Rosanne Milliken of Vancouver is gearing up for an impressive rash of work in the new year with her German and U.K. coproducing partners.

Solo, a Sixth Sense-meets-Poltergeist-inspired suspense thriller, goes to camera Jan. 12 for a month of production, with Jon Voight (Coming Home), Cary Elwes (The Princess Bride), Saffron Burrows (Frida) and Vancouver actor Stephen Graham starring. In the Carl Binder (Just Cause) script, an unlikely group of adults come together to find a neglected child who has gone missing. Ghosts are involved.

Copro partners are London-based Hador Film Productions and Hamburg, Germany-based Quality International.

Josef Rusnak (The Thirteenth Floor) directs the film, budgeted at $8 million if they decide to include a visual effects package, $4 million without.

Financing, says Milliken, comes from German presales, the U.K. sale-and-leaseback, U.K. equity, Canadian tax credits and distributor advances from L.A.-based Crystal Sky.

Necroscope, also done with Hador, Quality and Crystal Sky, will be a $5-million feature directed by Bob Clark, a frequent Milliken collaborator on shoots such as Baby Geniuses. In the story, college kids stumble onto a telescope-like device that steals human souls. Prep begins while Solo is in production.

Milliken is also budgeting the 13-episode series Tekken, based on the Japanese action video game, for rights holder Crystal Sky, along with a feature called Werewolf, and an 18th-century period piece called Bordello, about a young girl raised in a house of ill-repute.

School of Life, the 2002 feature made with Ryan Reynolds (Foolproof) and David Paymer (The Burial Society), is in a bit of limbo since being delivered in the summer. The original distributor defaulted on a loan, says Milliken, and she’s now courting offers from other distributors.

Time’s a’tickin’ I

Lions Gate Television is producing 5 Days To Midnight, a $12-million, five-hour miniseries for Sci Fi Channel, David Kirschner Productions and Hallmark Entertainment Distribution. Production in Vancouver runs Dec. 17 to March 17.

In the thriller starring Timothy Hutton, a college professor stumbles across a briefcase filled with details of his gruesome murder – including photos and suspects – which is set to happen in five days. Producers call the production a cross between D.O.A. and 24.

Child actor Gage Golightly and Hamish Linklater (Live from Baghdad) costar. Michael Watkins (Las Vegas pilot, The X-Files series) will direct.

Sci Fi Channel will present 5 Days to Midnight next spring as five one-hour episodes, airing over five consecutive nights – one hour for each day Hutton’s character has to change his fate.

Time’s a’tickin’ II

B.C. resident film and television workers have a short time to throw their names in the annual Leo Awards hat if they want to vie for the local trophies this spring.

For productions completed between January and June 2003, entries must be in by Jan. 16. For productions completed between July and December 2003, entries must be in by Jan. 30.

The two-night Leo Awards event takes place May 28 and 29 at the Westin Bayshore Resort & Marina.

Go to www.leoawards.com for applications.

Evil doing

Touching Evil, a new series for USA Network, kicked off production of 13 one-hour episodes in Vancouver Dec. 1, with production of season one scheduled to wrap April 19.

Starring Jeffrey Donovan (Storyteller, Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2) and Vera Farmiga (UC: Undercover), Evil is based on a series by Granada Television in the U.K. about a crime-fighter made fearless as a result of a near-fatal gunshot wound to the head.

The series is executive produced by twin brothers Allen and Albert Hughes (Menace II Society, From Hell), who make their television debut with the project, along with Arnold Rifkin (Tears of the Sun) and actor Bruce Willis.

The series’ two-hour pilot premiers March 5.

On the docket

Lifetime and Sony Pictures Television have jumped before the traditional February pilot season with the legal drama Class Actions. The pilot stars Diane Venora (Hamlet) as a high-flying New York lawyer who moves to a small town with her teenage daughter to take a teaching position. Tangi Miller (Felicity) plays a law student. Production ran Dec. 8-20 in Vancouver with Charles Haid at the helm. Elon Dershowitz (Fallen) is a co-executive producer.

Film biz

The Vancouver-made documentary The Corporation – a festival favorite – will hit movie theatres in Vancouver and Toronto on Jan. 16. The film will also screen at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival in January.

Created by Mark Achbar (Manufacturing Consent), Jennifer Abbott and Joel Bakan, The Corporation explores ‘an institution with the legal status of a person, but one with no concern for ‘human’ values’ and its impacts on our environment, our children, our health, our media, our democracy, and even our genes.

Toronto’s Mongrel Media distributes.

Christmas goodies

CHUM station The New VI in Victoria gave out $5,250 from the Speakers Corner Charitable Fund to three charities – PEERS (Prostitutes Empowerment Education and Resource Society), The Open Door (for Victoria’s homeless) and VCPAC Adult Crossing Guard Program. So far The New VI has given $13,650 to the three groups.