The cast for the upcoming Machine Gun Preacher has been confirmed: Michael Shannon (Jonah Hex), Michelle Monaghan (Eagle Eye, Source Code), Madeline Carroll (the upcoming Rob Reiner joint Flipped), Kathy Baker (Revolutionary Road) and Souleymane Sy Savane (Solo in the incredible Goodbye Solo) will all star alongside Gerard Butler in the Marc Forster-directed adaptation of the much-talked about Jason Keller screenplay.

The film tells the “based on a true” story of Sam Childers, “a once violent drug-dealing biker who went on to spend time in the most dangerous parts of Sudan and Uganda rescuing the youngest victims of war.” [Variety]

Shooting will start on July 5th, in Detroit then South Africa.

That title is something, eh? One can imagine a world in which Keller went into a pitch meeting with the title alone, and sold the thing. Hopefully it’s not this world, but hey, hope’s cheap these day. Or sold it as “Blood Diamond meets Sons of Anarchy meets Hotel Rwanda.”

Forster needs something solid. It’s been a while since Finding Neverland.

Do you like Butler as a leading man? Does this project interest you?

E-mail Dan Mecca and be sure to follow him on Twitter. You can also interact with him on our Facebook page!

THR is reporting Michael Shannon (Revolutionary Road, Jonah Hex) will play the villain in the upcoming thriller Premium Rush, directed and co-written by David Koepp (Ghost Town, Secret Window). Joseph Gordon-Levitt (500 Days of Summer, Inception) will be joined by female lead Jamie Chung (Sorority Row, Grown Ups). Read the full story

E-mail Jordan Raup here. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook for the latest TFS updates!

The Runaways is two-thirds of a very good film, the other third is sadly just a watchable standard biopic. It’s a film that starts off running and then hits a disappointing roadblock far down the road. It doesn’t ruin the film though. In fact, The Runaways still happens to be a rather strong feature debut for acclaimed music video director Floria Sigismondi. Read the full story

The Greatest, the directorial debut of screenwriter Shana Feste, does the incredible feat of being heartbreaking and heartwarming at the same time, drawing the audience into this deeply moving film. Read the full story

Floria Sigismondi‘s The Runaways is a pretty confused biopic of the all-girl rock band that formed during the 1970s. It is based on Cherie Currie’s memoir Neon Angel: A Memoir of a Runaway, but it is Joan Jett who earns an executive producer credit. It doesn’t know whether to focus on the individual performers, or the rise and fall of the band as a whole, and as a result, the film’s storyline is a pretty uninteresting one, especially if you’ve seen other rock band biopics in the past. Luckily, The Runaways has a terrific look to it, and good enough performances to draw you in, even when Sigismondi‘s script is pushing you away. Read the full story

My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done (Werner Herzog, USA/Germany)

Werner Herzog had never been an easy director in a narrative sense, and that’s a large part of the grandeur that sits behind some of his greatest films, i.e. Aguirre and Fitzcarraldo. And while My Son, My Son revels in absurdity far more the those two classics, the quarrelsome search for identity its hero (Michael Shannon) takes on is nearly as jarring and effective.

Shannon feels perfect for the role of Brad, a strange young man who kills his mother with a sword and then takes hostages in his L.A. home (don’t worry, all of this is revealed early on). This incident is a frame for the rest of the film, which attempts to explain Brad’s actions the same way Eugene Ionesco tried to explain existentialism – by being very existential.

Which is to say this film will be hard to sit through for most. There are many laughs at supposedly serious scenes and wonderful visuals where there perhaps should not be any (at an airport in Calgary for example). But then that’s always been Herzog’s way – to find wonder everywhere and anywhere amongst the travesty that is human life. Big words, sure, but not for this director. The film is also “presented” and produced by David Lynch, so do not be surprised by double the strangeness that goes on with both auteurs at the helm.

Read the full story

Comedian Will Arnett (Arrested Development) and recent Oscar Nominee Michael Shannon (Revolutionary Road) have just officially joined Warner Brother’s upcoming 2010 summer tent-pole Jonah Hex. Arnett will be playing a union soldier who enlists Jonah Hex and is blindsided by the dirty fighting style of his enemies. Michael Shannon is set to play Doc Cross Williams, the bizarre ringleader of a brutal gladiator circus event. That character also may be featured in future installments. The cast already includes Josh Brolin (Milk), Megan Fox (Transformers), and John Malkovich (Being John Malkovich). Jonah Hex is set for August 6th, 2010.

Will Arnett seems like an odd casting choice, but then again it’s Will Arnett so it would be a sin to call this bad news. Michael Shannon is of course great news. While it sounds like more of a cameo, Shanon will still most likely be great as he usually is. 

What do you think of this cast? Are you excited for Jonah Hex?

- Jack Giroux

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button leads with 13 Nominations.

Here are the 81st Academy Award Nominations:

Best Picture

The Reader

Slumdog Millionaire

Frost/Nixon

Benjamin Button

Milk

Best Actor

Richard Jenkins in The Visitor

Frank Langella in Frost/Nixon

Sean Penn in Milk

Brad Pitt in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler

Best Actress

Anne Hathaway in Rachel Getting Married

Angelina Jollie in Changeling

Melissa Leo in Frozen River

Meryl Streep in Doubt

Kate Winslet in The Reader

Best Supporting Actor

Robert Downey Jr in Tropic Thunder

Phillip Seymour Hoffman in Doubt

Michael Shannon in Revolutionary Road

Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight

Josh Brolin in Milk

Best Supporting Actress

Amy Adams in Doubt

Penelope Cruz in Vicky Cristina Barcelona

Viola Davis in Doubt

Taraji P. Henson in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Marrisa Tomei in The Wrestler

Best Director

Gus Van Sant for Milk

Danny Boyle for Slumdog Millionaire

David Fincher for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Howard for Frost/Nixon

Stephen Daldry for The Reader

Best Original Screenplay

Courtney Hunt for Frozen River

Mike Leigh for Happy-Go-Lucky

Martin McDonagh for In Bruges

Andrew Stanton for Wall-E

Dustin Lance Black for Milk

Best Adapted Screenplay

Eric Roth and Robin Swicord for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

John Patrick Shanley for Doubt

Peter Morgan for Frost/Nixon

David Hare for The Reader

Simon Beaufoy for Slumdog Millionaire

Best Animated Feature Film

Bolt

Wall-E

Kung Fu Panda

Best Art Direction

Changeling

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

The Dark Knight

The Duchess

Revolutionary Road

Best Cinematography

Changeling

Slumdog Millionaire

The Reader

Benjamin Button

The Dark Knight

Best Costumes

Australia

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Milk

The Duchess

Revolutionary Road

Best Documentary Feature

Encounters at the End of the World

Man on Wire

The Betrayal

The Garden

Trouble the Water

Best Documentary Short Subject

The Conscience of Nhem En

The Final Inch

Smile Pinki

The Witness – From the Balcony of Room 306

Best Animated Short Film

La Maison en Petits Cubes

Lavatory – Lovestory

Oktapodi

Presto

This Way Up

Best Live Action Short Film

Auf der Strecke (On the Line)

Manon on the Asphalt

New Boy

The Pig

Spielzeugland (Toyland)

Best Film Editing

The Dark Knight

Slumdog Millionaire

Frost/Nixon

Benjamin Button

Milk

Best Foreign Film

The Baader Meinhof Complex

The Class

Departures

Revanche

Waltz with Bashir

Best Makeup

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Dark Knight

Hellboy II

Best Original Score

Wall-E

Slumdog Millionaire

Defiance

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Milk

Best Original Song

Down to Earth from Wall-E

O Saya from Slumdog Millionaire

Jai Ho from Slumdog Millionaire

Best Sound Editing

The Dark Knight

Wanted

Iron Man

Wall-E

Slumdog Millionaire

Best Sound Mixing

The Dark Knight

Wanted

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Wall-E

Slumdog Millionaire

Best Visual Effects

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Dark Knight

Wall-E

The Oscars are hosted by Hugh Jackman will take place on February 22nd.

Do you agree with the nominations?

I feel like I have been defending Leo DiCaprio all year. But I also feel like he deserves it. Having finally seen Sam Mendes’ Revolutionary Road, I feel almost unable to properly criticize it. Adapted from Richard Yates’ timeless, and extremely dense, 1961 novel, this film is fairly faithful to its source, primarily a satirical cautionary tale that ends in tragedy.

And while it is far from flawless, Revolutionary Road is interesting. Now, I know that reads like a dubious compliment, but I mean it, I truly do. This is an extremely thought-provoking piece of art that made me want to run out and find an excuse to stay with my friends so we could talk about it some more. Answers the “what” questions and breach the “why” questions.

And let me not forget that the performances are across-the-board incredible. In his review of the film in The New Yorker, David Denby wrote of DiCaprio’s performance as Frank Wheeler: “Frank is a liar, an adulterer, and a compromiser who betrays himself as much as his wife, but DiCaprio projects a natural heroic sweetness—it’s in his movie-star genes—which, in this case, is at odds with the character he’s playing.”

This is certainly true, but replace the negative critical tone with a positive one. Frank Wheeler, in both the book and the film, is a fickle man, swayed by other men and other men’s dreams, too scared to be confident in his own. In that inability there is an inherent tragic heroic-ness, and DiCaprio embodies it to perfection. However, Kate Winslet steals the show without a doubt. As April Wheeler, the veteran actress breathes an amount of life into her character not present in the book. While DiCaprio had much more material to work with the Frank character, it appears that Winslet decided simply to create her own form of the 50s housewife.

While the cinematography is faultless and the score (by the great Thomas Newman) is simple and effective, the direction can best be summed up in one word: professional. Mendes is something of a “method director.” It appears as though he falls in love with the story he’s telling and then goes out of his way to execute said story to perfection, leaving no room for error and, in turn, no room for spontaneity. And while this may have hurt a film like Jarhead, which examines the psychological breakdown of a soldier during peace in wartime, it helps this film, which is fueled on the absence of spontaneity.

Professionalism and all, this is still somewhat of a ridiculous film, and certainly heavy-handed throughout. Scenes screen as if Leo and Kate are on Broadway, or even back on the Titanic, the performing is so thick. Some members of the audience laugh out loud during scenes of anger and insults, quickly silenced as the fight rages on, sometimes for several minutes. But then, much like the widely-ignored Australia, this is a kind of extroverted acting not popular in today’s media. We tend to want our heroes brooding, tortured, tall, dark, and always handsome. The less they say the better. Too bad for DiCaprio, Frank Wheeler never shuts up. But then, how many people do you know like that?

Whether you appreciated the performance acting or not, this is a harsh look at the American Trap, a.k.a. “settling down.” Mendes (and one wonders if Yates knew when he wrote it) knows this trap is timeless, and knows the prevalence of it today. Sure, this is a suburbs mellodrama, but it is not ABOUT the suburbs. In their 1/13/09 review of the film on the /Filmcast, the guys over at slashfilm.com were quick to point out the far-fetchedness of the story and the resolution, deeming it a suburban worst-case scenario of sorts. And that it is. But is that not part of what a satire’s purpose is? Granted, this is certainly not a traditional satire and, in many ways, not one at all. However, as a whole the film mocks the American Trap and warns against it, much in the same way Sidney Lumet’s Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead did, following along the basic rules of satire and adding a poignant dose of reality. It asks the question: What if you abide by all of society’s rules? Even if you know they’re wrong?

Young people should see this film right now. It will haunt you out of your seats and force you consider yourself next to the characters on-screen, and I imagine you’ll find yourself praying that you are most comparable to the only “crazy” character in the whole film, John, played convincingly by the criminally underrated Michael Shannon.

Kate Winslet’s April asks the first question: “Who made these rules?”

Mendes leaves it up to the viewer to ask, and answer, the second: “Why follow them?”