An old "South Park" episode spoofing the Sundance Film Festival once joked that independent movies are just about gay cowboys eating pudding. Now it seems mainstream ones are headed that way too.
<img src="heathjake.jpg" hspace="10" align="right" />After the varied reaction to his "Hulk", Director Ang Lee is headed to a less FX-heavy genre for his next film - a sweeping period epic based on the novel by multi award winning author E. Annie Proulx about the romance between two Wyoming stockmen and already it seems he's lassoed his two young bucks according to <a href="http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117898422?categoryid=13&cs=1" target="_blank">Variety</a>.
Aussie heartthrob Heath Ledger ("A Knight's Tale", "The Order) and "Donnie Darko" himself Jake Gyllenhaal have scored the leading roles of a rodeo cowboy and a ranch hand respectively, who meet in the 60's and forge a lifelong connection despite intolerance from others and themselves, until it all ends tragically.
The project is being put in some very adept hands as well, aside from Lee and Pollux's story, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Larry McMurtry ("The Last Picture Show", "Lonesome Dove", "Terms of Endearment") is adapting the script whilst Focus Features will produce.
If the project sounds familiar it should, Director Gus Van Sant and producer Scott Rudin were developing it a few years back with the hope of Matt Damon & Ben Affleck starring, but then put the project in turnaround where it was picked up by Focus who have gone with Lee, Ledger and Gyllenhaal.
Thanks to 'Westie'
