The Playlist

Review: 'High School' With Adrien Brody Is Your Standard-Issue Stoner Comedy

By Gabe Toro
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June 1, 2012 3:04 PM
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2 Comments

Reviews

There’s a long and underwhelming tradition of marijuana-fueled comedies, some overt, others less so. Even as the subgenre ages, however, it’s impossible to note the lowered aspirations of filmmakers each time out, as “pot” comedy has become part of a genre where increasingly timid filmmakers merely check off boxes in lieu of embracing the kind of irreverence that comes with the use of controlled substances. By the self-consciously layered title, you can guess where “High School” falls on this spectrum.

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Watch: Adrien Brody Is The Pot Dealing Psycho Ed In Trailer For 'High School'

By Kevin Jagernauth
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April 5, 2012 4:27 PM
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4 Comments

News

So how long has the stoner comedy "High School" been sitting around? Let's just put it this way: we saw this movie two years ago at the Fantasia Film Festival (review here), and at the time it was still seeking distribution. Well, it finally got picked up by Anchor Bay sometime between then and now, and it's headed to theaters, and we'll be curious to see if it's been edited or changed in that time.

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Tony Kaye & Adrien Brody Talk Shooting On The Fly & Improvising In 'Detachment'

By Jen Vineyard
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March 15, 2012 12:58 PM
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News

"Detachment" could be read as an indictment of the public school system -- thanks to the bleak portrayal of a school where no parents show up for parents' night, where students threaten each other as well as their teachers with violence, and where the only "good" student commits suicide in public. But director Tony Kaye and lead actor Adrien Brody also intended "Detachment" to be an "homage" to teachers, who are played in the film with varying levels of despair by Christina Hendricks, Tim Blake Nelson, Blythe Danner, James Caan, and Marcia Gay Harden. Kaye and Brody explained to The Playlist how the film came together in a not-by-the-book style.

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Watch: Adrien Brody, Christina Hendricks & Bryan Cranston In Trailer For Tony Kaye's Teaching Drama 'Detachment'

By Oliver Lyttelton
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January 16, 2012 11:40 AM
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3 Comments

News

Tony Kaye could have had the world as his oyster. An award-winning commercials and music video director, he landed one of the hottest scripts around, with a fast-rising star, for his directorial debut, "American History X," with Edward Norton.

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Tran Ahn Hung's Aborted 'Night Dogs' With Adrien Brody Would've Had Jimi Hendrix Score; Director Plotting French Novel Adaptation Next

By Simon Dang
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January 3, 2012 1:18 PM
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4 Comments

News

While he's no Terrence Malick, Vietnamese-French director Tran Anh Hung isn't exactly rushing movies out. Since his critically acclaimed debut "The Scent Of Green Papaya" in 1993, only five films have arrived from the helmer, one of which, neo-noir "I Come With The Rain" starring Josh Hartnett, has never really seen the light of day. During that time in the limelight, though, Tran had one particular project fall apart at the seams: his adaptation of Kent Anderson's post-war drama "Night Dogs," which he recently discussed with Twitch.

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Tribeca Film Plans Theatrical/VOD Release for Tony Kaye's 'Detachment'

By Drew Taylor
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September 8, 2011 7:40 AM
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1 Comment

'Black Water Transit' Still Never Coming Out

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Oscar Isaac, Elijah Wood, Adam Brody, Ryan Phillippe, Kristen Wiig Will Be 'Revenge For Jolly!'

By Edward Davis
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September 7, 2011 5:53 AM
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0 Comments

Actors Oscar Isaac, Elijah Wood, Adam Brody, Ryan Phillippe, Kristen Wiig, David Rasche, Kevin Corrigan, Garret Dillahunt, Bobby Moynihan, and Gillian Jacobs are all part of the recently wrapped “Revenge For Jolly!” directed by short filmmaker Chadd Harbold and starring Brian Petsos. How does a project with this many big names go unannounced and under the radar? Well, it's a indie and the the debut film of Atlas Independent, the newly-formed affiliate company of Charles Roven’s Atlas Entertainmenta company that focuses on development and production of films budgeted under $10 million (Roven known by fans as one of the producers of Christopher Nolan's Batman series).

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Watch: Weird, Kind Of Overwrought Clip From Tony Kaye's 'Detachment' With Adrien Brody

By Kevin Jagernauth
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April 26, 2011 5:44 AM
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5 Comments

Believe us, we're rooting for director Tony Kaye if only because he's had an uphill battle in Hollywood ever since "American History X." With his last two efforts being either ignored (the powerful abortion documentary "Lake Of Fire") or mired in film studio bankruptcy woes (the New Orleans thriller “Black Water Transit” starring Laurence Fishburne, Karl Urban and Brittany Snow) the guy could use a break. It's just too bad that his latest, the star-studded "Detachment" doesn't look like it will fit the bill.

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Review: 'Wrecked' Is A Car Crash You'll Want To Look Away From

By Kimber Myers
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April 1, 2011 5:00 AM
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0 Comments

“Wrecked” does a rare thing. While most movies founder in their third act, this indie survival film actually gets more interesting and watchable in its final 30 minutes. But it’s getting to that final third that’s the real ordeal here. You’ll have to endure the first half hour, with star Adrien Brody crying and occasionally panicking as he wakes up, stuck in a car at the bottom of a cliff with no memory of who he is. It’s 30 minutes of his unnamed character struggling to free his crushed leg from an even more crushed car, wondering who the corpse in the backseat is and worrying who he might be.

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Q&A: Adrien Brody Talks 'Wrecked,' Rumored Super Hero Roles & Working With Wes Anderson Again

By Kimber Myers
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March 31, 2011 4:49 AM
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3 Comments

Actor Says His Body Of Work Is Eclectic Because "Actors Should Be Chameleons"Adrien Brody's career is a puzzling or fascinating one, take your pick. At the age of 29, in 2003, he became the youngest actor to win the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role (for Roman Polanski's "The Pianist"), but instead of rocketing to the A-list the actor took a circuitous path, taking on smaller, off-the-beaten-path roles, and only working on one film per year until 2008 when he started speeding things up a bit. His post "The Pianist" career -- which includes everything from Peter Jackson's "King Kong," "The Jacket," "The Brothers Bloom," to Wes Anderson's "The Darjeeling Limited" and "Hollywoodland" -- is an eclectic one and to hear it from the actor, this by design. Brody continues to switch things up taking on action roles ("Predators"), lo-fi experiments (Tony Kaye's still unreleased "Detachment") and B-movie detours ("The Experiment," "Giallo"). His latest move is very small indie film you may have only heard a tiny bit about and it hits theaters in limited release this weekend via IFC.

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