|
 But soon the braggadocious armor sheds away and the film
centers on a fractured relationship and generational disconnect
between a father, played by veteran actor Robert Duvall, and his
misunderstood son.
"The Judge," out in U.S. theaters on Friday and distributed by
Time Warner Inc's Warner Bros., sees two Hollywood stalwarts
face off in an intimate drama that takes place in and out of the
courtroom.
Downey, 49, plays Hank Palmer, a charismatic lawyer who enjoys
bending the rule book and earns big bucks in the city, while
Duvall, 83, plays a town judge in rural Indiana who is revered
for his honesty and integrity.
When the Palmer family matriarch dies, Hank grudgingly returns
home and tries to reconnect with his stubborn father as they
become entangled in a murder mystery.
"I just love the divide that's between Joe Palmer and Hank
Palmer, that there's been 20 years of misunderstanding," Downey
said. "Hank just wants to be understood, but he really has to
come to understand this great man."
Downey channels the confident persona he inhabits in Marvel's
"Iron Man" franchise and as the fictional British detective in
the "Sherlock Holmes" films, but slowly strips away the
arrogance to reveal Hank's vulnerability.
"They're these two men from different generations who have come
to some sort of peace with each other," Downey said.
As Hank is pulled back to small town life, he evaluates his
relationships with his older brother Glen (Vincent D'Onofrio), a
former high school athlete, and his younger brother Dale (Jeremy
Strong), who documents his family's journey with a Super 8 video
camera.
[to top of second column] |
Hank also finds himself facing two very different lawyers in the
courtroom - the friendly C.P. Kennedy (Dax Shepard), who deals
antiques on the side, and Dwight Dickham, the straight-talking
prosecutor (Billy Bob Thornton).
"I'm usually being prosecuted," Thornton, who plays a lawyer for the
first time in his career, said with a laugh.
"It was hard to overcome the fact that I was prosecuting Duvall, who
I'm very close to. So I had to just forget about that being him."
"The Judge" is the first film from Team Downey, the production
company started by Downey and his wife, Susan.
It sees Downey take on a more serious role to the action and comedy
fare he has inhabited in recent years. While Downey's wife said the
actor didn't make the decision to take on drama intentionally, she
praised his nuanced performance.
"I think that Robert, the subtlety of what he's brought to Hank, and
the raw experience that you go from seeing the guy we recognize from
other movies in the beginning and watch that being stripped away and
seeing the journey he goes on, I feel like sometimes that's
undervalued," Susan Downey said.
(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy; Editing by Leslie Adler)
[© 2014 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2014 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
 |
