It looks like Anton Corbijn's adaptation of A Most Wanted Man is basically starting over from scratch. Earlier this year, the film looked to be moving forward with Philip Seymour Hoffman and Rachel McAdams as the two leads, but yesterday McAdams was replaced by Robin Wright. And now, it looks as if Hoffman is out, and in will be stepping Willem Dafoe.
Based on the John Le Carre novel, the story follows a Chechen/Russian Muslim who illegally immigrates to Hamburg, Germany. There he falls under the care of an idealistic lawyer and a banker, sweeping them both up in the international war on terror. The book is being adapted by Andrew Bovell(Lantana).
So they're really aging up the cast here, which should give the film a totally different texture. Not sure what happened to Hoffman and McAdams, and to be honest the changes don't excite me all that much. Corbijn makes for a perfect fit for Le Carre's weighty material, though, so that's reason alone to keep this film firmly on the radar. [Variety]
