Posted on Monday, January 10th, 2011 by Russ Fischer
Last year, we brought you a small casting report on an indie called Goats, when Ty Burrell joined the cast. Now, eight months later, the film still hasn’t shot, but a few more significant names have been added. David Duchovny and Vera Farmiga have signed on, and the film will shoot in February. Read More »
Sitting opposite Ed Norton in an empty conference room in a skyrise, one can’t avoid thinking about the hyper-charged situations he’s glared down on film. Clad in a black shirt and noticeably relaxed, he takes a moment before responding to a question, pressing a small washer-like object into the table and letting it spring back. It allows a brief window to search for the chiseled Nazi skinhead who forced a thug to tooth a curb in American History X. And for the office drone who scaled barbwire fences late at night to steal the excess fat of women and absorbed grueling punches in Fight Club. And for the smack dealer in 25th Hour who walked man’s best friend by a World Trade Center-less horizon, as unprepared for a future in the clink as the U.S. was for its uncertain present.
Norton is obsessively drawn to characters whose scariest adversary is in the mirror. It doesn’t matter if the playing field is a study in madness or a testy, possibly concluded, stint in the Marvel Universe as Bruce Banner. His latest film, a thoughtful thriller entitled Leaves of Grass, puts a literal spin on his interest in duality. He plays formerly estranged, highly intelligent twins—one a respected and reserved philosophy professor, the other a shaggy distributor of hydroponic marijuana.
Posted on Wednesday, March 10th, 2010 by Hunter Stephenson
Over the years, we’ve come to expect the sight an actor playing twins or clones on screen to either be yanked for low-brow laffs and shenanigans (Multiplicity, Double Impact) or to spiral down a freaky reveal about the human condition (Dead Ringers, Moon, Big Love). The latest word on Leaves of Grass, starring the challenge-welcoming Ed Norton in roles as a longhaired drug dealer and his straight-and-narrow twin, is that it’s an original and scrappy mix of twin genres, with a healthy splash of violence.
Below we have an exclusive clip where Norton offers a green hit to his twin and gives meta-meaning to peer pressure. One of my friends felt the stoner twin’s accent and personality bordered on kooktarded—personally have no problem—but let us know what you think. Leaves of Grass opens on April 2nd and premieres this Friday, March 12, at the SXSW Film Festival in Austin, Texas.
Posted on Sunday, November 15th, 2009 by Hunter Stephenson
We were beginning to wonder if Leaves of Grass, a pot comedy thriller starring Edward Norton in the role(s) of identical twins, had hit a buzz or release snag. Or worse: try to recall the actor’s Pride and Glory from last year. But judging by this new, rapid-clip trailer, complete with Norton pronouncing “crystal meth” in a thick country accent, Leaves might have yielded a nice return on a visual gag so infamously exploited by Van Damme actioners. Add in wretched black light posters, scenes with Susan Sarandon as the twins’ knowing mom, and Richard Dreyfuss channeling Nic Cage’s iguana rage, and it’s worth a laugh.
Posted on Wednesday, November 11th, 2009 by Russ Fischer
I do remember, but it takes some work. Earlier this week there was a poster debut for his new film Extraordinary Measures, which was notable for the image being extraordinarily forgettable. Now the trailer has hit for the Harrison Ford film, which co-stars Brendan Fraser and Keri Russell as a couple whose two kids are diagnosed with a terminal disease. They go to a researcher, played by Ford, and attempt to bootstrap a company with the resources to develop what the kids need to survive. Catch the trailer after the break, and pine for bygone days when Harrison Ford was great. Read More »
The first production photos from Leaves of Grass have premiered on the Toronto Film Festival website. The firlm is written, directed and produced by Tim Blake Nelson, starring Edward Norton as Bill Kincaid, an Ivy League classics professor, who “returns to rural Oklahoma to bury his dangerously brilliant identical twin brother, only to discover that the brother he believes to have been murdered has lured him home to involve him in a doomed plot against a local drug lord. Before Bill can flee, he’s implicated in a murder, and his life has become completely unraveled, suggesting that no rational philosophy can protect us from life’s twists and dangers.
Bill Kincaid, an Ivy League classics professor, who returns to rural Oklahoma to bury his dangerously brilliant identical twin brother who had remained in their native state to grow hydroponic pot. The official plot synopsis says that “Leaves of Grass is a fast-paced comic film that contrasts two distinct approaches to life.” You will see in the photo above that Norton plays both of the twins. The film co-stars Susan Sarandon, Keri Russell, Melanie Lynskey, Maggie Siff and Richard Dreyfuss, some of wholm you can see in additional production photos included after the jump.
A television spot for Walt Disney Pictures’ upcoming Adam Sandler family fantasy comedy Bedtime Stories aired during House. When I talked to Hairspray director Adam Shankman last year, he compared the film with Princess Bride. Check it out and tell me what you think in the comments below.
Official Plot Synopsis: An adventure comedy starring ADAM SANDLER as Skeeter Bronson, a hotel handyman whose life is changed forever when the bedtime stories he tells his niece and nephew start to mysteriously come true. He attempts to take advantage of the phenomenon, incorporating his own aspirations into one outlandish tale after another, but it’s the kids’ unexpected contributions that turn Skeeter’s life upside down. From Director Adam Shankman (“Hairspray,” “The Wedding Planner”), BEDTIME STORIES features an all-star cast, including Adam Sandler, Guy Pearce, Keri Russell, Richard Griffiths, Courteney Cox, Lucy Lawless, Teresa Palmer, Russell Brand, Aisha Tyler, Jonathan Pryce.
Bedtime Stories hits theaters on December 25th 2008.
Warner Bros has pushed August Rush back from October 19th to Wednesday, November 21st.
The film will now go head to head with The Coen Brothers’ No Country for Old Men, Paul Thomas Anderson’s There Will Be Blood, the Jon Heder comedy Mama’s Boy, and the Frank Darabont adaptation of Stephen King’s The Mist. Seems to me that Warner has moved the film into a very unfavorable release date, which makes me wonder what the decision was made behind the scenes. Check out the film’s new theatrical movie poster to the right. Click on the photo to enlarge.
August Rush is a music-driven drama. A charismatic young Irish guitarist (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) and a sheltered young cellist (Keri Russell) have a chance encounter one magical night above New York’s Washington Square, but are soon torn apart, leaving in their wake an infant, orphaned by circumstance. Years later, performing on the streets of New York and cared for by a mysterious stranger (Robin Williams) who gives him the name August Rush, the child (Freddie Highmore) uses his remarkable musical talent to seek the parents from whom he was separated at birth.
