Recent news about the potential green light for a Jonah Hex film has been interesting, mostly because it suggests that Josh Brolin might actually possess the Power Cosmic. How else do you explain comments he made earlier this week to MTV?
But once I started putting people in my mind and saying what if I put Malkovich in this role then what does this movie become? Now let’s put this producer and director on it and think about how it plays out. Then it becomes fun. Now I love that movie. If you have a great filmmaker come in then suddenly these gags and characters become interesting.
Can Brolin pick his directors and co-stars now? That’s…awesome, for him, if so. But we can ill afford another Ed Norton. Use your power wisely, Mr. Brolin.
When news broke yesterday that the directorial team of Neveldine and Taylor had walked away from Hex, I wondered to what extent the newfound star power of Josh Brolin may have played a part. Now I wonder even more, though Brolin seems to love the script. Or, more to the point, he loves it now.
Brolin loves “the absurdity of it. It almost allows you to create a new genre. I love going back into the spaghetti-Western idea and completely turning it around.” But that wasn’t his first reaction. “I’ve been going back and forth about it. I went back to my gut: “Is it a sellout? What is it I like about this movie?” When I first read it, I thought, “Oh my God, it’s awful!” And then I had a moment a week later, and I thought, “Why is it awful?” Maybe the thing to do is to do the most awful movie I can find.”
His most telling statement about the movie has been, also to MTV, “It’s really [about] having fun with a movie and getting a director that’s phenomenal.” The implication that’s easy to read is that Neveldine and Taylor weren’t the phenomenal directors he was looking for. I’m eager to hear the full story, and see who ends up helming the picture. (And I still wonder, despite Brolin’s apparent love for the script, whether that Neveldine/Taylor draft will hit screens as is.)