It seems to be an Ari Aster kind of week.
The writer-director will release “Beau is Afraid,” starring Joaquin Phoenix, on April 21st. The film has started screening for press this week. It’s a 3-hour existentialist “Jewish Comedy” as Aster describes it.
In a New York Times interview with Joshua Rothkopf, Aster even let it slip that he’s already working on his next film, which will star Phoenix, and is said to be a western.
“What he was doing with his own name was very brave, and arguably suicidal,” the filmmaker said. “And that to me was thrilling.” In coy half-nods, Aster let on that they have another project in development; his next film will “almost certainly” be a western.
No other details were given. You can’t blame Aster for ever repeating himself. He’s been hopping from one genre to the next with “Hereditary,” “Midsommar” and “Beau is Afraid.” A western would surely be more uncharted territory for him.
Rothkopf also briefly gives his thoughts on “Beau is Afraid”
A rippling pitch-black comedy […] Teary-eyed and pitched on the edge of panic, Beau is unlike anything Phoenix has created, save for one notorious turn that now feels like a watershed: “I’m Still Here” (2010), supposedly a chronicle of the actor’s breakdown. Aster identified that mockumentary meltdown, poised between humor and cringey self-ruination, as the Phoenix performance that grabbed him.
We’re not entirely sure what the response will be for this film. It’s quite the undertaking, especially if you’ve read the script that’s been circulating online. All I know is that Aster is this fascinating filmmaker who loves to take risks, and there’s no bigger risk than a 3-hour film about a deranged man-child who has mommy issues.
Criterion's December lineup has some great additions to the library, but the title that jumped out at me is Werner Herzog's "Grizzly Man," which officially joins the Collection on December 8.