Bradley Cooper, who has been getting ever more popular in the last few years, will be starring opposite Ryan Gosling in upcoming crime drama, The Place Beyond The Pines, Variety reports.
Cooper’s had a brilliant few years, with overnight success after The Hangover in 2009, and has since followed it up with The A-Team last year, Limitless this year, which he was excellent in, and of course The Hangover: Part II, which has made more than 0 million in all of a week.
The Place Beyond The Pines will be directed and co-written by Derek Cianfrance, whose last film, Blue Valentine, was high on many people’s favourite films of last year, and earned Michelle Williams an Academy Award nomination. I think it’s always promising when directors and actors return to work together, so given that Cianfrance and Gosling have already done that on Blue Valentine, I think this next project is certainly one to look forward to.
Gosling will be playing a pro-motorcycle rider (I hope of the motocross variety, because that could make for some fun scenes) who turns to a life of crime in bank robberies after the birth of his son. Cooper will be starring as the rookie police officer trying to bring Gosling down. Variety describes the film as a multi-generational crime drama, so we can perhaps expect to see the pair going head-to-head over the years, with Cooper rising through the ranks in the force.
Given that he’s so well-known for his comedic role in The Hangover, a lot of people wouldn’t expect Cooper to take on a more serious role like this, but I think it’s definitely the kind of role he can do comfortably, and do well. He started out with a much more serious role in TV’s Alias, and he was great in that, and his performance in Limitless this year garnered a lot of attention for him, perhaps precisely because people didn’t expect that kind of role from him. So there’s every reason to expect another brilliant performance from him in The Place Beyond The Pines.
Principal photography is expected to begin on 25th July in New York, with Sidney Kimmel Entertainment (Adventureland, Alpha Dog, The Lincoln Lawyer) financing and producing. If all goes well, hopefully we can look forward to seeing this sooner rather than later. A lot of people will be looking to see what Cianfrance follows up Blue Valentine with, and I think having Gosling and Cooper both attached to his next project definitely shows a lot of promise.
