Jena Malone Signs On To Co-Star With Josh Hutcherson In Short Film For Ron Howard And Canon’s Project Imagination: The Trailer

Hunger Games Co-star to Join Hutcherson’s Short Film, “The Rusted,” Inspired by a Consumer Trailer

MELVILLE, N.Y., July 23, 2015 – Canon U.S.A. Inc., a leader in digital imaging, announced today that “The Hunger Games” actress Jena Malone has signed on to co-star with Josh Hutcherson in a short film for Canon’s Project Imagination: The Trailer, a consumer contest helmed by Ron Howard. Josh Hutcherson and Ron Howard have selected the winning trailer, “Tainted Water” created by Mark Mukherje, a college student from South Florida, to act as the inspiration for the film, “The Rusted,” which will go into production this week.

“The Rusted” is a psychological thriller, a new genre for Josh Hutcherson, written and directed by Kat Candler (“Hellion”) and tells the story of a brother and sister who begin renovating their childhood home into a recording studio, when strange happenings force them to face memories of the past.

“Being part of Canon’s Project Imagination and working with Ron, Kat and now Jena have really allowed me to express my passion for storytelling,” said Josh Hutcherson. “I’m excited to bring the vision to life as a producer on the project and acting opposite a dear friend.”

“When Josh presented me with the script, I thought it would be fun to do something different together like a psychological thriller and it’s hard to pass up a project with Ron Howard behind it,” said Jena Malone. “I also love that the film is part of this very cool, creative experiment tapping into consumers to inspire and elevate our imaginations.”

Project Imagination: The Trailer is the third iteration of Project Imagination, Canon’s ongoing initiative to empower creativity in everyone. The program, which launched in February 2015, also marked Ron Howard’s third time partnering with Canon, a brand that aligns with his conviction that people’s everyday lives are visually and cinematically worth recording, bringing high quality and ease to photo and video capture with Canon cameras and lenses. Consumers of all skill levels were invited to create and submit 60-second trailers and entry level participants could utilize Canon’s Trailer Editor tool which is still available for consumer’s use at imagination.usa.canon.com.

About Canon U.S.A., Inc.

Canon U.S.A., Inc., is a leading provider of consumer, business-to-business, and industrial digital imaging solutions to the United States and to Latin America and the Caribbean (excluding Mexico) markets. With approximately $31 billion in global revenue, its parent company, Canon Inc. (NYSE:CAJ), ranks third overall in U.S. patents granted in 2014† and is one of Fortune Magazine’s World’s Most Admired Companies in 2015. In 2014, Canon U.S.A. has received the PCMag.com Readers’ Choice Award for Service and Reliability in the digital camera and printer categories for the 11th consecutive year. Canon U.S.A. is committed to the highest level of customer satisfaction and loyalty, providing 100 percent U.S.-based consumer service and support for all of the products it distributes. Canon U.S.A. is dedicated to its Kyosei philosophy of social and environmental responsibility. In 2014, the Canon Americas Headquarters secured LEED® Gold certification, a recognition for the design, construction, operations and maintenance of high-performance green buildings. To keep apprised of the latest news from Canon U.S.A., sign up for the Company’s RSS news feed by visiting www.usa.canon.com/rss and follow us on Twitter @CanonUSA. For media inquiries, please contact [email protected].

About Ron Howard

Ronald William “Ron” Howard (born March 1, 1954) is an American actor, director and producer. He came to prominence as a child actor, playing Opie Taylor in the sitcom The Andy Griffith Show for eight years, and later as the teenaged Richie Cunningham in the sitcom “Happy Days” for six years. He made film appearances such as in “American Graffiti” in 1973 and while starring in “Happy Days” he also made “The Shootist” in 1976, as well as making his directorial debut with the 1977 comedy film “Grand Theft Auto.” He left “Happy Days” in 1980 to focus on directing, and has since gone on to direct several films, including the Oscar(r) winning “Cocoon,” “Apollo 13,” “Frost/Nixon,” and “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.” Ron won the Academy Award(r) for “A Beautiful Mind” as the Director and also producer of the film. In 2003, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts.

About Josh Hutcherson

Josh Hutcherson has quickly become one of Hollywood’s most accomplished young actors. He has received many accolades including the 2012 Cinema Con award for “Breakthrough Actor,” MTV Movie Award for “Best Male Performance,” the Teen Choice Award for “Best Actor: Sci-Fi/Fantasy” and Logo’s New Now Next Award for the “Next Mega Star.” Josh is best known for his portrayal of Peeta Mellark in the highly successful franchise, “The Hunger Games”, alongside Jennifer Lawrence and Liam Hemsworth. Josh reprises his role in “Mockingjay Part 2” in November, 2015. In addition, Josh stars opposite Benicio Del Toro in “Paradise Lost”, a drama about the notorious kingpin, Pablo Escobar.In 2010, Josh co-starred alongside Annette Bening and Julianne Moore in Lisa Cholodenko’s Academy Award nominated feature film “The Kids are All Right”. Additional film credits include the animated film “Epic”, “Red Dawn”, a remake of the 1984 classic, “Journey 2: Mysterious Island”, the independent feature film “Detention”, in which Hutcherson also served as Executive Producer, an omnibus film entitled “Seven Days in Havana”, which features seven shorts directed by seven different directors, “Journey to the Center of the Earth 3-D”, the first ever high definition 3-D live performance feature, “Bridge To Terabithia”, “Zathura”, “Kicking and Screaming”, “Howl’s Moving Castle” and “The Polar Express”. Josh won Young Artist Awards for “Leading Young Actor” for his roles in “Zathura” and “Bridge to Terebithia”. In addition to acting, Josh is extremely involved with his charity organization, Straight But Not Narrow (SBNN). SBNN is an ally organization that prepares and trains young adults on how to become allies of their LGBTQ peer. In 2012, he was honored with GLAAD’s “Vanguard Award” for his work with the LGBT community.

About Jena Malone

As a rising actress distinguished by her versatility and multidimensional roles, Jena Malone continues to evolve with each new project. Malone can next be seen in The Hunger Games: Mockinjay Part 2, reprising her role as Johanna Mason, scheduled for release on November 20. Most recently, Malone starred in Paul Thomas Anderson’s Inherent Vice alongside Reese Witherspoon, Owen Wilson, Joaquin Phoenix and Josh Brolin. Additionally, Malone can be seen in The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1, reprising her role as Johanna Mason. Malone previously starred in The Hunger Games: Catching Fire. Other upcoming projects include Oren Moverman’s Time Out of Mind, which she stars alongside Richard Gere, and Mitchell Lichtenstein’s Angelica, based on the novel of the same name by bestselling author Arthur Phillips. She was recently cast as the lead role in Dori Oskowitz’s Claire, the American remake of Eric Rohmer’s 1982 French pic Le Beau Mariage. Malone starred opposite Kevin Costner and Bill Paxton in the History Channel’s mini-series Hatfields & McCoys, which broke cable records and became the new most-watched entertainment telecast of all time on cable. The mini-series earned an Emmy Nomination for “Outstanding Mini-Series” and a Golden Globe nomination for “Best Mini-Series”. Previously, Malone starred in Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch, Oren Moverman’s The Messenger, Sean Penn’s Into the Wild, Anthony Minghella’s Cold Mountain, Joe Wright’s Pride and Prejudice, Brian Savelson’s In Our Nature, and Richard Kelly’s cult classic Donnie Darko.

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† Based on weekly patent counts issued by United States Patent and Trademark Office.

SOURCE: Canon