It’s been three years since Jared Hess delivered us the ever so slightly underwhelming Nacho Libre, but fear not – the writer/director is back back back with Gentlemen Broncos, a film which, if the new trailer is anything to go by, is a return to his glorious Napoleon Dynamite form.
The film stars Michael Angarano (The Forbidden Kingdom, Sky High) as meek high schooler Benjamin Purvis. He’s a sci-fi geek who worships pretentious author Ronald Chevalier (Conchord Jermaine Clement, pitching a performance somewhere between Garth Marenghi and Todd Rivers from Darkplace), and is thrilled when they met at a sci-fi convention, only to learn later that the hack is passing off the student’s idea as his own. Naturally, things get worse when the book, called ‘Bronco’, becomes a huge success. Meanwhile, we get the joy of seeing Sam Rockwell – who seems to be making a habit of this in 2009 - play two versions of the character within Bronco. You can see the Gentlemen Broncos trailer here.
It all looks like a hoot, with echoes not only of Napoleon Dynamite, but also of Clement's previous big screen outing Eagle Vs Shark. This can only mean good things, and while there’s no UK release date set, you can expect it to follow closely on the heels of the US release on October 30. Mind you, it just might be the sort of film to turn up somewhere in this year’s Times BFI London Film Festival, running through the second half of October. Fingers crossed...