Three hot films premiering at SXSW
USA TODAY’s Mike Snider talks to the actors, directors and producers behind some of the hottest new films premiering at South by Southwest in Austin.
‘NEIGHBORS’: Rogen tries to grow up
Move over, Animal House — Seth Rogen and Zac Efron are staking claim to the top of the frat-boy party movie class.
They star in Neighbors, a raunchy comedy pitting Rogen (Mac), a thirtysomething husband and father, against Efron (Teddy), the president of a hard-partying fraternity that moves in next door.
Even though the film, due May 9, is not finished, director Nicholas Stoller wanted to show it here Saturday night. His debut of Forgetting Sarah Marshall in Austin in 2008 “was the best screening I’ve ever been at,” Stoller told the audience before the film played.
Writer/executive producer Brendan O’Brien got the idea Plus: Testing
for the script a new 3-D
when his wife headset
called the police because some college kids were being a nuisance next door. “That is kind of the idea of where this actually came from,” Rogen said before the screening. “If you actually had to live next to that, and you were someone who was trying to have some responsibility in their life, it would just be a disaster. That was funny to us.”
At first, Mac and his wife, Kelly, played by Rose Byrne ( The Internship), try to welcome the frat into the neighborhood. But their baby can’t sleep, and eventually, they have to fight back.
There are plenty of homages to Animal House. An almost-un-recognizable Lisa Kudrow plays the school dean.
Efron can still create a clamor: Shrieks were heard upon his arrival at the Paramount Theatre.
‘CHEF’: Favreau cooks up something new
Jon Favreau has stepped away from the blockbuster buffet to deliver a smaller, tastier dish.
The actor, screenwriter and filmmaker, who has put his stamp on the Marvel Universe as director of the first two Iron Man films and as executive producer of The Avengers, brought his newest movie, Chef, due May 9, here for its premiere.
“I wanted to do something in the culinary world, because it seemed like a very cinematic way to talk about the creative process,” he said before the screening.
“I’ve been doing bigger movies, and then one day, an idea for a whole movie hit me at once, and I scribbled out eight pages of outline, and that hasn’t happened to me since Swingers,” he told an audience a few minutes later. That film launched the career of Vince Vaughn and Favreau, who wrote, produced and starred.
As movie lovers seek out films online, smaller movies are becoming viable again, he said. “It is really good for all of us. Little ones like this, you can make for you and for an audience that will connect with it more personally. ... I’m really proud of it, and the cast is amazing.”
Favreau’s character, chef Carl Casper, butts heads with an L.A. restaurateur (Dustin Hoffman); they part ways, and Carl goes to Miami with ex-wife Inez (Sofia Vergara) and their son, Percy (Emjay Anthony), and fixes up a Cuban food truck. Scarlett Johansson captivates as Molly, the raven-haired hostess at the restaurant where Carl is forced out.
‘A NIGHT IN OLD MEXICO’: Duvall’s ride
Fans of Robert Duvall’s work on Lonesome Dove will want to spend A Night in Old Mexico with the Oscar-winning actor.
His new film, screening here this week, is a redemptive story of Titus “Red” Bovie, an ex-rancher who’s evicted from his home. “He’s kind of a descendant of the two guys in Lonesome Dove,” Duvall says. “It’s just a nice, sweet film that we (he and Lonesome Dove co-screenwriter Bill Wittliff ) waited 25 years to do.”
On the day Bovie is evicted, a grandson he has never known, Gally (Jeremy Irvine), shows up on his steps. The loner suddenly has a sidekick he doesn’t want.
“He’s very set in his ways and tough on his newfound grandson, and probably because he’s a very difficult guy to live with, he’s lost a wife and a son,” says Duvall, 83. “But now his life is turning around in a very positive way.”
Duvall, a famed tango dancer, gets to show off his footwork in the film, and he also sings, something he did in the role of Mac Sledge in Tender Mercies.
There’s a message for viewers in that none of the characters — Red, Gally or a lounge singer they meet on the road, Patty Wafers (Angie Cepeda) — are ready to give up on their dreams.
“Follow your dream, and maybe your dreams pay off. Sometimes you don’t even know what your dreams are, and they come to fruition, and I think that happens in this film, definitely.”
A Night in Old Mexico will hit theaters in May.