Ben Affleck Is So Much "American Bulls**t"

Even if "The Town" doesn't score an Oscar nomination for Best Picture, Ben Affleck should be extremely proud of the film he directed, co-wrote and starred in. The film has been nominated for a slew of awards this past season and found itself named as one of the National Board of Review's top ten films of the year.

While Affleck puts on a solid performance in the film, it's his work as director and writer where his skills truly shine through. More often than not action/crime films are overlooked at award's season, but due to Affleck's deft direction and reflective writing the film has an emotional base and proves itself to be a great movie rather than just a great "action" film (which it is as well).

Affleck has shown, along with "Gone Baby Gone," that he truly has a knack for directing and that it may be what the longtime actor is best at. With the success of "The Town" Affleck has made himself quite the hot director and he is considering a few different projects for his next effort says The Wrap.

According to the site Affleck is heavily considering Eric Warren Singer's "American Bulls**t" as his next directorial effort.

Sony Pictures has the rights to the script which is described as "the true story of Abscam, the FBI's 1980 undercover sting operation of Congress to root out corruption, which was the brainchild of the world's greatest con man," according to Deadline.

Affleck is also considering a couple other projects including the 1970's Yankee wife-swapping story "The Trade" and "Replay," an adaptation of the Ken Grimwood novel.

Dave Mandel wrote the "The Trade," which follows the fantastically interesting story of New York Yankees pitchers Fritz Petersen and Mike Kekich who swapped wives back in the 1970s. Jason Smilovic, who penned "Lucky Number Slevin," adapted Ken Grimwood's novel "Replay," which follows a forty-year-old radio journalist who dies and gets to relive his life over and over in his 18-year-old body.

While I think all of the projects sound interesting I'd like to see what Affleck could do with "American Bulls**t" or "The Trade," both of which seem like they could be really solid films. The director has shown he has quite the touch with crime stories, so Affleck and Abscam could be quite the pairing.

Either way Affleck should make a decision soon on what he'll like to take on next behind the camera. The Academy Awards will be held February 27, 2011.

Alexander Payne Visits "Nebraska"

Based on his past work, Alexander Payne and the road movie genre is usually a pretty damn good mix. The past two feature films he has directed, 2002's "About Schmidt" and 2004's "Sideways" were both road trip films and the latter might be considered his best work.

With his next film, "The Descendants" starring George Clooney, in post-production Payne has set his sights on another road project that he has held onto for quite a few years, the simply titled "Nebraska."

According to The Playlist the story is about an aging alcoholic father who thinks he’s won a million dollar Publisher’s Clearing House sweepstakes prize.

While his family thinks he's crazy for wanting to take the long trip from Montana to Nebraska to claim his alleged winnings, they can't dissuade him. Along for the ride is the man's estranged twentyish year old soon, who was forced to come along to keep him out of trouble, alowing the two to bond after years of separation.

According to the site Payne has had the script around since 2004 and had really taken a liking to it, but after back-to-back road films ("Sideways" and "About Schmidt") he wanted to step away from that for a bit. Clearly he thinks enough time has passed because Payne is now working on rewriting Robert Nelson's original script along with Phil Johnston ("Cedar Rapids").

While Payne has never been the type of filmmaker to churn out projects year after year his work is always top notch. "Election" is one of the best and underrated films of the past twenty years and I thought "Sideways" was just pure genius. This type of story seems perfect for a filmmaker like Payne, who seems to know exactly how to portray realistic middle-aged male emotions.

In a sense Payne is like Judd Apatow, but instead of showing a realistic portrayal what it's like to be a late-twenty something slacker who looks like Seth Rogen, it's more like a fifty something guy that looks like Paul Giamatti.

Currently there are no actors attached to the film but the site mentions Casey Affleck and Robert Forster as two "very" early candidates. Payne aims to kick off shooting on "Nebraska" later this year while "The Decendants" should be released later this fall or winter.