For the second year in a row, it seems that we won't be getting a new Coen Brothers film. The directors had been especially prolific in recent years, with four films in four years between "No Country For Old Men" and "True Grit," but producer Scott Rudin confirmed a while back that it was unlikely that their latest, "Inside Llewlyn Davis," would be ready in time for release in 2012, despite the hopes of many. We suspect we won't see the film until Cannes next year at the earliest, but fans should take heart: a project that the brothers had a hand in will be surfacing over the next few months.
Years ago, as a paycheck assignment gig, the duo wrote a remake of the 1966 Michael Caine/Shirley MacLaine caper flick "Gambit," and after years in development hell, the film finally made it into production in 2011, with Michael Hoffman ("The Last Station") at the helm, and Colin Firth, Cameron Diaz and Alan Rickman in central roles. And Orange have just unveiled a pair of character posters for the film, focusing on Firth and Rickman's characters, as well as a lion who will presumably figure into the plot.
"Gambit" sees Firth play an art curator who teams up with a rodeo rider (Diaz) to rip off England's richest man (Rickman). While the film was pushed back by U.S. distributors CBS Films into early next year, UK audiences get to see the movie, courtesy of Momentum Pictures, in November. The posters (which should be joined by at least one more featuring Diaz, and possibly a trailer, before the end of the week) suggests that the Coen connection is high on their marketing priorities list. We're certainly interested to see how things turn out, even if we're not expecting the world from the film — we'll be bringing you our verdict near the UK release on Wednesday November 21st, ahead of its US release in early 2013. Check the posters and full synopsis out below, and we'll add more as they come in.
Update: One more poster, featuring Diaz riding a suitcase, has been unveiled.
Private art curator Harry Deane (Colin Firth) devises a finely-crafted scheme to con England's richest man and avid art collector, Lionel Shabandar, (Alan Rickman) into purchasing a fake Monet painting. In order to bait his buyer, he recruits a Texas rodeo queen (Cameron Diaz) to cross the pond and pose as a woman whose grandfather liberated the painting at the end of WWII.
BAFTA award winner Sir Tom Courtenay, Golden Globe winner Stanley Tucci and Academy Award© winner and veteran comedienne Cloris Leachman round out the cast.
