The Beaver may not have been quite the comeback that Mel Gibson wanted, but it was probably the comeback that he deserved. Still, signs point to the fact that the film’s relative under-performance is due less to disdain for the actor and more towards a general sense of disinterest and lack of awareness about the film. For real comeback action Mel Gibson will probably have to work in a genre that has more potential for audience impact. How about some form of buddy comedy — that being the format that defined one stage of his career thanks to the Lethal Weapon films? Indeed, he is now in talks to join the buddy heist comedy Sleight of Hand, which has Kiefer Sutherland, Gerard Depardieu and Thomas Jane set for smaller roles. Read More »
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Remember The Beaver? First-time writer Kyle Killen‘s spec screenplay created all sorts of buzz around Hollywood, ended up on the 2008 Black List (a list of the hottest unproduced screenplays of the year), and gained the interest of Steve Carell and director Jay Roach. A lot of people, including former /Film writer Brendon Connelly called the screenplay “one of the few very best screenplays” he had “ever read.”
Roach and Carell left the project, and Jodie Foster (who directed Little Man Tate and Home for the Holidays) came aboard to helm the project with Mel Gibson in the leading role. Gibson’s problems in his personal life have caused this film to sit on the shelf, while Foster has tried to fine tune the film’s tone, and Summit Entertainment brainstorms ways to market a movie starring an actor who has made anti-Semitic and racist remarks. But the studio has been quietly positioning the film to be Gibson’s comeback project.
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Summit Entertainment must have gotten some pretty good buzz from early screenings of their controversial Jodie Foster/Mel Gibson film The Beaver because, according to Box Office Mojo, they bumped it back from its original March 23 release date. It’ll now open limited on the much more desirable summer date of May 6 before expanding on May 20. That will put it in direct competition on its limited weekend with Thor and on its wide weekend with Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides.
Directed by Foster and starring Gibson and Foster, The Beaver will have its first public premiere at South by Southwest next month. If you haven’t seen the trailer, you can watch it after the jump. Read More »
SXSW announced today that a handful of additional titles were being added to the line-up for the 2011 SXSW Film Festival, including Jodie Foster‘s Mel Gibson dramedy The Beaver, Greg Mottola‘s sci-fi comedy Paul starring Simon Pegg, Nick Frost and Seth Rogen, and Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop, a documentary that follows behind-the-scenes of O’Brien’s summer tour, among others. Read the full press release after the jump.
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The headline gags just seem to write themselves, but calm down — this is purely a release date post. Summit has announced a date for Jodie Foster‘s film The Beaver, in which Mel Gibson plays a family man who goes down a dark, angry road before being led back into the family fold by a plush beaver puppet. The film will hit some markets on March 23 2011, and then expand on April 8, with the number of theaters for April 8 likely to be determined based in part on the film’s critical and box office performance in the first limited weekend.
So can Mel Gibson sell the story of a guy who cracks up and then finds redemption? Is it completely crazy that the plot for his first post-rant film seems to reflect his own life so closely? Or can you look at The Beaver as just another movie, totally divorced from any real life goings-on? Sound off after the break. Read More »
Posted on Monday, December 13th, 2010 by David Chen
What does a bad first date, a fist fight with Mel Gibson, and the beginning of all space and time have in common? Well…
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A few new movie posters were released online today, including a new character poster for Kevin Smith‘s horror film Red State, an international one-sheet for Darren Aronofsky‘s Black Swan, Aardman Animation’s Arthur Christmas, and the first poster for the Jodie Foster-directed film The Beaver starring Mel Gibson. Hit the jump to check out the new one sheets now.
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Earlier this year, when audio recordings of Mel Gibson‘s rants against his girlfriend were released, one of the first casualties seemed to be Summit’s film The Beaver, which Jodie Foster directed and in which she co-stars with the actor. She defended him and the film, and Summit took the movie to ground to wait out the first swell of controversy.
But the company recently announced that the film would see a wide release in spring 2011, and now there’s a trailer. Watching it, I can’t help but think this is the best possible movie Mel Gibson could be appearing in right now. It seems almost tailor-made for a man in the situation he’s built for himself. Read More »
