Older bro Ben tends to hog most of the headlines, but Casey Affleck is certainly riding professional high at the moment. Just as Manchester by the Sea, an upcoming Kenneth Lonergan film in which Affleck stars, is making waves on the festival rounds and cementing its place as a key 2016 awards players, news broke today (courtesy of The Hollywood Reporter) of Affleck’s follow-up project – the indie survival film Light of My Life in which Affleck will star in as well as direct; he also penned the screenplay.
While details concerning Light of My Life on currently being kept under lock and key for now – including a potential start date, possible casting announcements or key financing (though Black Bear Pictures, whose recent efforts include The Imitation Game and All is Lost, appears a possible candidate on that front) – this looks to be Affleck’s next project. The basic plot concerns a father and daughter who are trapped in the woods. The material is reportedly dark but as of now there’s little else to go on. Affleck previously directed the short film collection The Book of Charles and the infamous Joaquin Phoenix hoax I’m Still Here (2010). He also had a writing credit on I’m Still Here as well as the Gus Van Sant experimental 2002 curio Gerry.
As for Manchester by the Sea, that feature made a sensation when it premiered at Sundance last winter and has chugged along with warm response at the recently concluded Telluride Film Festival. A stop at the Toronto and New York Film Festivals are still to come before Amazon and Roadside Attractions release the film in theaters on November 18th. The somber drama centers around an uncle forced to care for his nephew following the death of his brother. Kyle Chandler (Carol), Michelle Williams (Blue Valentine) and Lucas Hedges co-star in the project that’s already generated a ton of awards heat, particularly for Affleck, who earned an Oscar nomination previously for his performance in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.
In the last year, Affleck has appeared in Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar, Craig Gillespie’s The Finest Hours and John Hillcoat’s Triple 9.
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