Movie fans were shocked today with the news that Oscar-winner Adrien Brody is turning action hero to star in the Robert Rodriguez-produced Predator reboot, Predators. At first I thought maybe he’s trying to distance himself from the Roman Polanski mess by picking a movie as far from The Pianist as possible. But then I remembered that since winning Best Actor six years ago Brody has done little to show himself worthy of the award (he’s great in The Darjeeling Limited at least).
But will anybody believe him as a guy who can defeat a bunch of Predators? That he’s better than Arnold Schwarzenegger, who barely survived one of them? That he’s the guy to lead kick-ass costars like Danny Trejo, Oleg Taktarov, Walt Goggins and even … umm … Topher Grace (he’s at least been an action movie villain before, even if a bad one)? Well, obviously this gig is going to require that supposed Oscar-caliber talent in order to convince us.
Check out the stunned reactions from other film bloggers after the jump:
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Of the seven features I watched in full whilst at the 2009 CineVegas Film Festival, it seemed that the bravest endeavors, those that took the greatest stabs into the unknown both formally and conceptually, were actually shot on film. If this isn’t notable enough in a space increasingly dominated by digital photography (and, all too often, an aesthetic indifference that fails to push beyond the ease of use of the tools), the fact that films like Impolex, Modus Operandi and Redland are all the first features of men either barely or not quite the age of 30 is astounding. While other young filmmakers exploit ever-changing technology to shrink production budgets and experiment with non-theatrical models of distribution, Alex Ross Perry, Frankie Latina and Asiel Norton have made uncompromising films that defy contemporary technological trends and notions of financial convenience.
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