One of the things I love about living in New York City is that it's easy for us to spot trends before, say, folks from Memphis (sorry Memphis, but your boys choked BIG TIME last night). Part of this is because most NY'ers travel by mass transit -- allowing everyone to see what everyone else is wearing, reading, watching, etc ... When I'm on the train, I particularly like to check out what the hot books are. Usually you can tell which book is hot because one out of three people are reading it. At the height of The Da Vinci Code madness, I couldn't even tell you how many people were on that one. (I'd even catch some who took off the dust jacket in an attempt to hide the title because they didn't want other people to know they were reading what everyone else was reading. No joke.)
I watch the book trends because I like to see which are being turned into movies. This, in turn, helps me predict which upcoming movies will do well at the box office. If I see a lot of people reading one book, chances are those same people will run to the theater when the film comes out. Now, I haven't been out on the train too much in the past month, but I've noticed one book that doesn't seem to be going away. In fact, I visited two bookstores before finally finding it in stock. (In the last subway car I rode in, I counted three different people reading it.) The book? The Road, by Cormac McCarthy.
Everyone and their (his?) mother loves The Proposition, the Nick Cave-penned Australian western starring Danny Huston as a villain who could give Chigurh a run for his money in sheer badassery. It's hard to blame them, since movies that gritty and tough don't come along very often. (As modern westerns go, I think 3:10 to Yuma is better, but it certainly isn't as awesomely brutal.) Two years after that film became a critical darling and a sleeper hit of sorts, director John Hillcoat -- who is currently in production on Cormac McCarthy's The Road -- has signed with Columbia to direct an adaptation of a not-yet-released novel by Matt Bondurant called The Wettest Country in the World. The book is about a trio of gangsters -- the author's grandfather and grand-uncles -- who ran the moonshine trade at the peak of the Prohibition Era, and the writer who tracked them in search of a scoop.
The new Cyborg movie...sorry... The upcoming post-apocalyptic Cormac McCarthy adaptation, The Road, has got itself a leading lad. The Hollywood Reporter has posted that the son who gets to travel around with Viggo Mortensen is Aussie actor Kodi Smit-McPhee. This is the kid who might be playing the young Logan in the upcoming Wolverine movie, and he played Raimond Gaita in the memoir adaptation Romulus, My Father.
The 11-year-old's role in the film is to travel with Papa Viggo on "a months-long journey across a barren U.S. landscape after a cataclysmic event destroyed most of life on Earth." Somewhere along the way, they remember mom, because Charlize Theron will play the wife and mother in flashbacks. (Bana, Mortensen, Potente, and Theron, aren't bad movie parents to have at the start of your career!) After the success of No Country for Old Men, expectations are pretty high for this feature, and for me especially, since I love director John Hillcoat'sThe Proposition.
That being said ... I think I should read the book, because I just keep putting Viggo's face over Van Damme's, Theron's over the old, dead love interest, and now Kodi's face over the cyborg he travels with. All we need is Bender, and this new flick is set!
At last count, it looked like Guy Pearcemight have been replacing Viggo Mortensen in the upcoming adaptation of Cormac McCarthy'sThe Road. Fortunately (and no offense, Guy) it looks like Viggo is still on board ... plus he just got a gal named Charlize Theron as a co-star. According to Variety, the Oscar-winning blonde will play the main character's wife, a small but important character who will appear mostly through flashbacks.
An admitted fan of the source material, Ms. Theron will be working alongside director John Hillcoat (of the excellent The Proposition) and screenwriter Joe Penhall (of the strangely entertaining Enduring Love). The adaptation, which is being produced by 2929 Entertainment and distributed by the Weinsteins' Dimension Films, tells the story of "a man who embarks on a nightmarish road trip after a nuclear explosion in an attempt to transport his son to safety while fending off cannibals." Awesome.
And thanks also to Variety for the reminder: I need a good book for my Sundance flight -- and The Road is definitely going to be it. I think that will be the first "Oprah's Book Club" selection that I've ever read. (No offense, Oprah.)
No Country for Old Men, the new film from Joel and Ethan Coen, is an unquestionable return to form. It is scary, funny, moving, violent, and meaningful, in pretty much equal measure. The Coens' take on the Cormac McCarthynovel of the same name is a pairing as successful, as seamless, as delicious as that of chocolate and peanut butter.
Josh Brolin gives the finest of his four excellent performances this year as Llewelyn Moss. Moss is a struggling everyman who stumbles upon a circle of trucks and dead Mexicans in the desert -- a heroin deal gone bad. Real bad. The lone survivor asks Moss for some agua, and Moss ignores the request. He surveys the scene and eventually comes upon a suitcase filled with $2 million dollars. Moss' response upon finding the money? A simple "Yeah." It's a perfect moment in a movie packed with them. Moss takes the money and returns home to his trailer and his wife Carla Jean (Kelly MacDonald). Soon, his conscience begins to nag at him, and he decides to head back to the scene of the crime to give the dying man a drink. A compassionate decision, but not, as you can probably imagine, an intelligent one.
Javier Bardem plays Anton Chigurh (start to say Chicago and then growl and you're close to the pronunciation). I'll leave his specific involvement in the proceedings up to you to figure out, but just know that he really wants that $2 million. Moss will come to refer to Chigurh as "the ultimate badass," and that's about right. Chigurh is a classic screen villain, the kind we haven't seen in far too long. Every time he appears on screen, cattle stunner in tow, it just makes your heart sink -- somebody is going down. Much like Hannibal Lecter, the guy is a vicious, remorseless killer, but he has a strangely sensible logic and one can't help but be seduced by him. Bardem, sporting a Prince Valiant haircut, gives a flawless performance here, one that will likely be noticed come Oscar time. He completely disappears into Chigurh.
What a difference a month can make. Back in September, Viggo Mortensen seemed pretty confident when he told MTV Movies Blog that he was in talks to star in a big-screen version of Cormac McCarthy's, The Road. Now, Shock Till You Drop is reporting that Guy Pearce could be replacing Mortensen in the film. Mortensen was never officially confirmed, so Pearce as a replacement would seem to be the most likely scenario -- especially since the story isn't exactly teeming with characters. The novel focuses on a father and son who are survivors of an apocalyptic event and are trying to make it to 'the coast' while surrounded by fellow survivors who have reverted to cannibalism. If you haven't read the book, I really recommend picking it up, although be warned: don't let that Oprah Book Club selection sticker lull you into thinking this is a feel-good story. Nothing could be further from the truth.
John Hillcoat is already set to direct the Joe Penhall adaptation and since Hillcoat worked with Pearce on the revisionist western, The Proposition, back in 2006, that could tip the scales in Pearce's favor. The film could be a bit of a hard-sell with audiences to begin with. There is some truly disturbing stuff going on in the story, and for those of you who have read the book, you probably know what I mean. Luckily, no matter which actor they go with, I think either would be more than capable of handling the role, don't you? The Road is tentatively scheduled for release in 2009.
It might just be me, but Viggo Mortensen always struck me as the kind of actor who was just better suited for dark and heavy material. I'm sure he's nowhere near that tortured in his day-to-day life, but for me, the man is built for drama. MTV Movies Blogspoke with the actor about his latest collaboration with Canadian director David Cronenberg, Eastern Promises, (you can catch James' TIFF interview with the director here) and Mortensen clued them in to what his next role might be. He tells MTV that he's close to signing to star in the film version of the Pulitzer prize-winning novel The Road, by Cormac McCarthy. According to the actor, "They're going to make a movie of that and the people making [it] have expressed interest [in me]. Visually, it's going to be a very beautiful movie. It's a very good story". News of the adaptation surfaced last November, when Nick Wechsler purchased the rights to the novel and hired The Proposition's John Hillcoat to presumably direct.
The novel centers on a father and son who are survivors of a "doomsday" scenario, traveling towards the coast while battling other survivors who have turned cannibal. Released in 2006, the book was an Oprah book club selection (but try not to hold that against it) and spent some time on the best-seller list. Back in April Joe Penhall was hired to adapt the book, which will the be the latest in a series of adaptations of the authors work with The Coen's No Country for Old Men, followed by Ridley Scott's Blood Meridian in 2009. Having read the book, I can speak from experience that it's a harrowing story that does a spectacular job of showing you the nobility and the depravity we are all capable of in the name of survival. Mortensen is still working on the period drama Good, and will also appear in the Ed Harris Western drama, Appaloosa. So while nothing is official, I would assume that if Mortensen is already spilling the beans to MTV, then it would seem all that's left to do is sign on the dotted line.
An ordinary man stumbles across a ring of corpses surrounding a fortune in cash and a mountain of heroin. A bad man follows in search of the money; a good man follows in search of the man. This is the set-up for the newest film from Joel and Ethan Coen, No Country for Old Men -- an adaptation of the Cormac McCarthy novel of the same name, and a brilliant example of how plot devices as simple as murder and money can be used to explore larger sweeping themes of mortality, morality and more -- while still delivering rousing, intelligent pure entertainment.
Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin) is out hunting when he stumbles across a scene of murder -- broken glass, bullet-ridden cars and bodies. A pick-up truck is full of heroin; he tracks his way to a lone corpse under a tree and an attaché case full of cash. It's two million. It's there for the taking. So he does. Soon, Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem) comes looking for Moss and the money, leaving a trail of dead men in his wake; local sheriff Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) tries to figure out the why and wherefore of the murder scene and tries to track Moss so he can stop Chigurh.
Many will mock or knock No Country for Old Men as Fargo, Texas style -- in truth, No Country for Old Men has much more in common with the lesser-seen Coen films Blood Simple and Miller's Crossing. The money only matters as something for people want; the murder as something that people do. The common perception of the Coens is that they're quirky comedians, but in many ways, they're also methodical moralists -- and No Country for Old Men gives them a canvas to explore in the broad burnished vistas of the West, and in the lives of those who live there.
Fresh off the arid desolation of the Australian Outback in The Proposition, director John Hillcoat is going to dip his cinematic toes into another bleak landscape by taking on some Cormac McCarthy. Although the author has been writing for over 40 years, his work is only hitting screens recently. Although the first attempt, Billy Bob Thornton's All the Pretty Horses flopped, there are three more waiting for their shot. First, we've got the Coen Brother's No Country for Old Men, which will be released later this year. Then, there is Blood Meridian, which Ridley Scott is still attempting to get filmed. And now, Hillcoat will be taking on McCarthy's most recent novel -- The Road, which Joe Penhall will adapt (as previously reported here).
This could be Hillcoat's break into mainstream, not as much due to the material, but due to the fact that the novel was just picked for Oprah's Book Club. Whoever would have thought that Oprah fans might fall in line to see a Hillcoat movie? The novel is set in a post-apolcalyptic world where a father and son have to travel for months to try and get to what was the Southeast U.S. Unfortunately, the world is over-run by cannibals that they have to protect themselves from, as well as surviving in a world where most life is gone -- both plant and animal, the sun and moon are blotted out and ash covers the earth. Hillcoat is pretty talented at making dusty grime look stunning, so he's a pretty perfect choice to helm the picture. With a spot-on choice for director, I wonder who they will get to play the father and young son. Any suggestions?
According to a story in Production Weekly, the Coenbrothers have
finally selected the story they'll direct next, and it's going to a screen version of Cormac McCarthy's novel, No Country for Old Men, takenfrom their own script.
Though all that we can really say about the movie at this point comes from a summary of the book, it sounds freaking
incredible (if you dig the whole noirish, hard-boiled thing). McCarthy's story is about a gent named Llewelyn Moss who,
while out hunting for antelope, instead comes upon a pile of dead men who happen to be in the company of over $2 million
and a whole mess of heroin. Not surprisingly - and because there would be no book or movie if he didn't - Moss decides
to take the money and the smack. And, because when $2 million and a lot of drugs go missing, someone always wants it
back, Moss finds himself immediately in danger and goes on the run with his young wife. As things escalate, "on
either side are men accustomed to spectacular violence and mayhem." Um, wow.
As a special bonus, the
movie - set in the American southwest - won't start shooting until spring, so we've all got ample time to read the book
before we see the Coen take on things.
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One of the things I love about living in New York City is that it's easy for us to spot trends before, say, folks from Memphis (sorry Memphis, but your boys choked BIG TIME last night). Part of this is because most NY'ers travel by mass transit -- allowing everyone to see what everyone else is wearing, reading, watching, etc ... When I'm on the train, I particularly like to check out what the hot books are. Usually you can tell which book is hot because one out of three people are reading it. At the height of The Da Vinci Code madness, I couldn't even tell you how many people were on that one. (I'd even catch some who took off the dust jacket in an attempt to hide the title because they didn't want other people to know they were reading what everyone else was reading. No joke.)
Everyone and their (his?) mother loves 
The new Cyborg movie...sorry... The upcoming post-apocalyptic Cormac McCarthy adaptation, .jpg)
At last count, it looked like 
What a difference a month can make. Back in September, 
It might just be me, but .jpg)
Fresh off the arid desolation of the Australian Outback in The Proposition, director 
According to a story in Production Weekly, the 
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