Already dreading the end of “Breaking Bad” in six weeks or so? It looks like Ridley Scott might have something to cure what ails you. It’s relatively unlikely that Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Cormac McCarthy was inspired by the popular and acclaimed series, given that he’s been writing about the cross-border world of drugs and gruesome murder for some time (most famously with the source material for the Coen Brothers‘ “No Country For Old Men“), but it’s hard to watch the new U.K. trailer for “The Counselor” (or, to use the U.K. spelling on this trailer, “The Counsellor“)—an original script by McCarthy, directed by Scott—and not find echoes of Walter White & co, especially when this new clip gives a glimpse of Dean Norris, aka “Breaking Bad“‘s Hank.
If you weren’t already aware, the film stars Michael Fassbender as the titular attorney, who becomes embroiled in a drugs trade, which as in all these movies, goes off without a hitch. Oh, wait, no, it leads to a bloody trail of murder and revenge. Fassbender heads off an all-star cast including the Brian Grazer-haired Javier Bardem as his partner, Penelope Cruz as his fiancee, Cameron Diaz as Bardem’s girlfriend and Brad Pitt as the man who puts the deal together.
The new trailer gives perhaps the best sense of the film itself so far, and it does seem to be something of a change of pace for Scott, which can only be a welcome thing at this point. Will it turn out to be an Oscar player, or is this a strictly a commercial prospect? The movie looks to be skipping the festival circuit entirely, unless it turns up at Telluride, but if Scott can get the alchemy right, it’s not impossible, even if the script is even bloodier and more uncompromising than “No Country For Old Men.” We’ll find out when the movie opens on October 25th. [Empire Online]
