About The Filmmakers

MARCEL LANGENEGGER (Director) makes his feature film debut with DECEPTION. Acclaimed for his distinct cinematic style, impeccable art direction and poignant storytelling in the commercial arena, the Swiss-born Langenegger is the recipient of three Clio Awards and a Cannes Gold Lion.

He directed a two-minute spot for Toyota via Circle Productions, Toronto, and Toronto agency Saatchi & Saatchi, which debuted during the Canadian broadcast of the Academy Awards. Langenegger shot a campaign for the Swiss Postal Service. He directed the spot via Chocolate Films, the company that represents him in Europe.

Langenegger attended art school and began his career as an art director and graphic designer in Switzerland. He moved to the United States in 1997 to pursue a Master's Degree in film at Art Center College of Design and, from there, he signed with Propaganda Pictures. One of his first professional assignments was a spot for Doctors Without Borders (Advico/Young & Rubicam, Zurich). The spot won a Gold Lion at the 2001 Cannes International Advertising Festival and a Gold Clio the following year. A spot that Langenegger directed for Swiss banker Migros (Advico/Young & Rubicam, Zurich) also won a Clio Award.

ARNOLD RIFKIN (Producer) is partnered with Christopher Eberts in the production company Rifkin/Eberts LLC. The company's projects include Blood and Bone and Night Train.

Previously, he produced film and television projects through his former production company, Cheyenne Enterprises LLC, whose credits included the feature films Live Free or Die Hard, Just My Luck, Bandits, Hart's War, The Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course, Tears of the Sun, The Whole Ten Yards, Hostage and Sixteen Blocks.

In television, Cheyenne Enterprises' credits include the animated series Gary the Rat on Spike TV (which featured the voice of Kelsey Grammer and was co-produced with Grammer's Gramnet), and the critically-acclaimed series Touching Evil on the USA Network, executive produced by Cheyenne and the Hughes Brothers (From Hell).

Before founding Cheyenne Enterprises, Rifkin had been a talent agent for over 20 years. He started his career at his company Rifkin-David and was a founding partner of the hugely successful Triad Artists. In 1992, Triad Artists was acquired by the William Morris Agency and Rifkin was named worldwide head of the WMA Motion Picture Department. In 1996, he ascended to the role of president of the agency, where he remained until September 1999. A few months later, in January 2000, Rifkin formed Cheyenne Enterprises with his former client of 17 years, Bruce Willis.

In addition to his work in the creative community, Rifkin sits on the Board of Directors at the American Cinematheque and serves as the co-chair of the Producers Program at the UCLA School of Theatre, Film & Television. During his tenure at the William Morris Agency, he created an internship program with Harvard MBA students, and over the last three years has lectured at Harvard's School of Business, Yale Law School, and The Learning Annex.

Raised in Brooklyn by Orthodox Jewish parents, Arnold attended the Yeshiva University program in Israel at age 16 and later attended the University of Cincinnati. The son of a fur manufacturer, Rifkin began his career in the fashion industry. He formed his first talent agency in 1976. He is married to Nikki MacGregor-Rifkin and has four children-ranging from the age of 16 months to 26 years old-and one granddaughter.

JOHN PALERMO (Producer) is a partner in Seed Productions, a venture he, Hugh Jackman, and Deborra-lee Furness started in July 2005 with an eye toward developing material for film, television, and theatre.

Seed has a first-look film deal with Twentieth Century Fox, with which it is partnered on X-Men Origins: Wolverine, starring Jackman.

In August of 2006, Seed launched Seed Australia, a Sydney-based division of the company that will produce and help finance Australian films.

Palermo started his career as the assistant to Bryan Singer on the first X-Men film, where he met Jackman. After a stint as Susan Sarandon's development executive and assistant, Palermo worked with Jackman on Van Helsing, the Broadway production The Boy From Oz, and The Fountain. He was most recently an executive producer on X-Men: The Last Stand.

ROBBIE BRENNER (Producer), after graduating with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Film and Television from New York University in 1993, moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in the movie industry. She began working for Red Ruby Productions, where she aided in the production of such films as Bullet and Fall Time. Soon after, she worked with producer Michael Obel on Nightwatch, released by Dimension Films.

Brenner then went to work for Miramax Films as a production and development executive. During her eight years there she climbed the ranks to Senior Vice President, overseeing and working on many films including On The Line, View from the Top and Serendipity. After leaving Miramax, Brenner went on to produce Haven, directed by Frank E. Flowers.

After spending two years working as a senior vice president at 20th Century Fox, where she oversaw projects such as Tender is the Night, Two Minutes to Midnight and Bandidas, Brenner was brought into Davis Entertainment as the head of their classics division. Last she was an executive producer on Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem. Currently, she is a producer on A Perfect Getaway, a thriller starring Timothy Olyphant and Steve Zahn.

DAVID BUSHELL (Producer) produced the comedy The Wendell Baker Story, written and directed by Luke Wilson and co-directed by Andrew Wilson. Bushell executive produced the critically acclaimed and award winning Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The movie, which earned Charlie Kaufman an Oscar® for Best Screenplay, stars Jim Carrey, Kate Winslet and Kirsten Dunst, and was directed by Michel Gondry. Shortly after the filming of Eternal Sunshine, Daily Variety named Bushell one of their 10 Producers to Watch.

His ongoing commitment to bringing independent spirited content to screen has resulted in such praised work as Billy Bob Thornton's Sling Blade. Bushell produced the film, which earned Thornton an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay.

He has also produced Bob Gosse's Niagara, Niagara, starring Robin Tunney; Nick Gomez' Illtown, starring Lili Taylor; Hampton Fancher's The Minus Man, starring Owen Wilson; and Laurence Fishburne's Once In The Life. He was the executive producer of Bob Dolman's The Banger Sisters, starring Susan Sarandon, Goldie Hawn and Geoffrey Rush.

CHRISTOPHER EBERTS (Producer) is partnered with Arnold Rifkin in the production company Rifkin/Eberts LLC. Previously, he was founder and CEO of Ascendant Pictures, an independent film development, production, finance, and foreign distribution company. Ascendant's credits included Lucky Number Slevin, Lord of War, The Big White, Ask the Dust, Edison, The Jacket, and The Punisher.

More recent projects include Black Water Transit, Outlander, Night Train and Blood and Bone.

Prior to founding Ascendant, Eberts was CEO and President of ScreenWorks Media, where he executive produced the documentary film Prisoner of Paradise, which was nominated for a 2002 Academy Award® for Best Documentary. Other producing credits include Half Past Dead, The Watcher, Chasing Holden, and Woman Wanted.

Before forming his own production banner, Eberts was Vice President of Production at Twentieth Century Fox, where he was responsible for all phases of feature film development and production, including solicitation of screenplays and other source material; screenplay analysis and development; assignment of director, cast and other creative elements; the securing of production financing and distribution arrangements, as well as the physical supervision of all aspects of the production process. With Twentieth Century Fox, Eberts was involved in the production of My Cousin Vinny, Rising Sun, and Alien III, among others.

MARJORIE SHIK (Executive Producer) was an executive at Arnold Rifkin's film and television production company, Cheyenne Enterprises LLC. Prior to that, she worked with Rifkin while he was president of the William Morris Agency.

Shik was a co-producer on the romantic comedy Just My Luck, starring Lindsay Lohan and directed by Donald Petrie for New Regency/Twentieth Century Fox.

Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, Shik received her degree from Syracuse University. After graduation, she went on to participate in basic training in the Israeli army and studied at Tel Aviv University.

DANTE SPINOTTI, ASC, AIC (Director of Photography) is a master craftsman whose work on such films as The Insider, L.A. Confidential, Heat, The Mirror has Two Faces, Crimes of the Heart and The Last of the Mohicans has earned him a formidable reputation.

In his native Italy, Spinotti worked with such internationally respected directors as Lina Wertmuller, Liliana Cavani and Giacomo Battiato before making his American debut with Michael Mann's Manhunter (1986), an early introduction to the Thomas Harris character Hannibal Lecter. He reunited with Mann for The Last of the Mohicans (1992), freeing his camera to accompany the trajectory of a bullet or the flight of a tomahawk, and again for the epic cops-and-robbers saga Heat (1995). Another frequent partner has been director Garry Marshall, the two teaming on Beaches (1988), Frankie and Johnnie (1991) and The Other Sister (1999). Spinotti was director of photography on two Michael Apted films, Blink and Nell (both 1994). He also filmed Brett Ratner's Red Dragon (2002), After the Sunset (2004), and X-Men: The Last Stand (2006).

Spinotti's collaboration with Curtis Hanson yielded the internationally acclaimed L.A. Confidential (1997). Rejecting classic noir approaches, Hanson and Spinotti pored over the work of Swiss-born still photographer Robert Frank, intrigued by a contemporary look and feel in his pictures that was simultaneously true to their period. After teaming with Roland Joffe for Goodbye Lover (1999), Spinotti again made the best of his locations and cast for Mann's The Insider (also 1999) and earned his first Oscar nomination. He then joined Hanson for Wonder Boys (2000), proving that dark, dreary weather is not incompatible with comedy.

He has twice won the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best Cinematography; first for L.A. Confidential in 1997 and then for The Insider in 1999.

PATRIZIA von BRANDENSTEIN (Production Designer) won an Academy Award for her work on Milos Forman's Amadeus. A long time collaborator of Forman's, von Brandenstein was art director on the director's film Ragtime and production designer on The People Vs. Larry Flynt, Man on the Moon and Goya's Ghosts.

She also designed three films for Mike Nichols: Silkwood, Working Girl, and Postcards from the Edge. Among her recent films are Ice Harvest, Shaft, The Emperor's Club, and All the King's Men and the upcoming Nights in Rodanthe.

Ms. von Brandenstein began her film career in 1977 designing the costumes for Saturday Night Fever. She started production designing on Peter Yates' Breaking Away. Other early credits include Heartland, A Chorus Line, The Money Pit, State of Grace, Tell me a Riddle and Billy Bathgate.

In 1988, Ms. von Brandenstein was nominated for an Oscar for her work on Brian De Palma's The Untouchables.

Her other credits include Sneakers, Leap of Faith, Six Degrees of Separation, The Quick and the Dead, Just Cause, Mercury Rising and A Simple Plan.

CHRISTIAN WAGNER's (Editor) numerous credits as editor include The Amityville Horror (2005), the James Bond epic Die Another Day, Man on Fire, Mission: Impossible 2, Spy Game and Face/Off. Next up for him is a new The Fast and Furious film, this one reuniting the original's stars, Vin Diesel and Paul Walker.

DOUGLAS CRISE (Editor) was editor on the independent picture The Nines, starring Ryan Reynolds, and on the critically acclaimed drama Babel starring Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett. He has worked in various editorial capacities on Ocean's Twelve, Good Night and Good Luck, 21 Grams and Ocean's Eleven.

SUE GANDY (Costume Designer), since moving to New York from Kansas City in 1975, has done everything from making elephant blankets for Ringling Brothers to singing in cabarets.

An acclaimed costume designer, her credits include Bonneville, directed by Christopher

N. Rowley, starring Jessica Lange and Kathy Bates, plus Judy Berlin, Guarding Tess, Ngati, Bridge to Nowhere, and Queen City Rocker.

Sue started her career in 1978 under the guidance of designer Ann Roth, when she was costume shopper for The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. Since then, she has also served as assistant costume designer on numerous highly praised films, among them Just My Luck, The Interpreter, The Hours, Two Weeks Notice, You've Got Mail, Private Parts, Guilty as Sin, School Ties, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, and The Mosquito Coast.

RAMIN DJAWADI (Music) is the composer on the much-anticipated big-screen adaptation of the comic Iron Man. His other credits include Mr. Brooks, Ask the Dust, Batman Begins (additional music), Blade: Trinity and Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl (additional music).

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