I have come to the conclusion that either James Franco can do everything, or he can do nothing. Franco certainly has a high estimation of his own abilities. Now it appears that he’s got at least one big name who thinks he can act. Wim Wenders has cast Franco as the main character in his latest foray into 3D drama Everything Will Be Fine.
Franco will play Tomas, a man who accidentally kills a child with his car following a domestic quarrel. The event has a profound effect on the rest of Tomas’s existence as he struggles to come to terms with the accident. Sarah Polley (Splice, Dawn of the Dead) has likewise been attached.
Wenders calls Everything Will Be Fine ‘a story of guilt and forgiveness.’ The premise itself has been done before – it sounds an awful lot like 21 Grams – but of course it has not been done by one of the greatest living directors. The crux here is that Wenders plans to shoot the entire film in 3D – indeed, the script was written with 3D in mind. Everything Will Be Fine will mark Wenders’ second 3D movie, following the critically acclaimed Pina. Leave it to a director like Wenders to find a use for 3D that does not include superheroes or big explosions.
It is the 3D, and not James Franco, that intrigues me about this film. Wenders has already proven that 3D can be used to exceptional effect by a director with deeper sensibilities than just spectacle. Everything Will Be Fine sounds like an intriguing premise to make use of the medium. 3D has the capacity to be an incredibly intimate form of filmmaking – even uncomfortably so, and I look forward to seeing what Wenders produces.
Production on Everything Will Be Fine will begin in August. Until then, we can see Franco in … well, in just about everything.