john irvin Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Last week, Mena Suvari told Ryan during a press junket that she would be in the upcoming adaptation of the great, unfinished Ernest Hemingway novel -- The Garden of Eden -- news that I couldn't be happier about. The picture is to be helmed by John Irvin. He hasn't done many high-profile films lately, but he is the guy behind the 80's film Hamburger Hill, so hopefully he's got the chops for the project. Now Variety has fleshed out the cast for us. Besides Suvari, there is Jack Huston (yes, of the Huston dynasty), Caterina Murino (Casino Royale) and Richard E. Grant (do I need to explain who he is!?).

As Ryan said last week, the storyline is a love triangle between an ex-pat (David) and wife (Catherine) traveling through Europe, and a woman named Marita who they both fall for. It's also an interesting and pretty progressive look at gender bending that Hemingway started to write just after the end of World War II. Throughout the novel and affair, Catherine experiments with masculinity -- wearing pants and getting her hair cut, as well as saying things like: "I'm a girl. But now I'm a boy too and I can do anything ..." Heck, the gender-bending even extends into the bedroom. This novel undoubtedly has its roots in Hemingway's own childhood, where his mother would dress him in girl's clothing. Of course, as Variety describes, Suvari will be playing Catherine and Murino will be playing Marita. Sliding the men into their roles should be easy enough, I imagine Huston will play David, and Grant will take on Colonel John Boyle -- an acquaintance of the couple. The film will start production this month in Spain, and hopefully release will come soon after.

At yesterday's Brooklyn Rules press junket, Mena Suvari, who plays the uptown girl who falls in love with Freddie Prinze Jr's Brooklyn tough guy in the film, was eager to talk up her upcoming projects, including Day of the Dead. I asked her if she gets to turn into a zombie in the film, to which she replied: "No, I play a corporal in the Army and I save the day!" She also said that she worked six day weeks on gun training and did all her own stunts. She also told me that she will be in director John Irvin's (Hamburger Hill, Next of Kin) upcoming adaptation of the Hemingway novel, The Garden of Eden. Set in Spain, the story is about an expat American and his wife who both fall in love with a beautiful young woman named Marita -- the part Suvari will presumably play. "It's very deep. It's a Hemingway story, it's one of his last stories and its a very complicated piece," Suvari said. "We're shooting in Spain and it takes place in Spain and the south of France. I'm very excited about that."

I also asked Suvari about her very, very brief part as Richie Berlin in Factory Girl, and whether it was all that was left of something more substantial: "They took a couple things out, but there were so many cameos in that movie that were taken fully out ... they weren't in the movie," Suvari said. "They had me come in and shoot some extra footage that didn't go in there. Richie Berlin wasn't a huge fan of Andy Warhol, so she wasn't so much in the Factory. And I didn't really know what they were doing with it and with the character. Richie never really wanted to talk to me ... I had to dig to do my research. But she talked about how she felt like she was the only one who really cared about Edie, so they tried to play that up in the film and add a couple of things, and then they did a different route with Edie, making it more of a narrative, like when she's talking about it in the hospital, all of that was added later. They just went a different route." Stay tuned for a full Brooklyn Rules report.