The first trailer for the Coen Brothers’ Inside Llewyn Davis is now available.  The story centers on the titular folk singer/songwriter, played by Oscar Isaac, who struggles to find his way in New York’s Greenwich Village in the 1960s.  The trailer shows us that, although he’s not overtly a ne’er-do-well, everyone around him sure does seem to despise him quite a bit.  Llewyn’s lover Jean Berkey (Carey Mulligan) is particularly vicious while John Goodman’s character appears to be more of a curmudgeonly businessman/agent type, with some apparent health problems.

Also starring Justin Timberlake, Garret Hedlund, Adam Driver and F. Murray Abraham, Inside Llewyn Davis opens later this year.  Hit the jump to see the trailer.

In March, we learned that FX and MGM Television were mulling over a potential series adaptation of Fargo.  Not only is the project a go, but Joel and Ethan Coen are on board to executive produce.  That bodes well for the translation of Fargo to the small screen.  Here’s the bad news: Deadline reports Noah Hawley will write and executive produce the hourlong drama.  Hawley most recently created My Generation, which was offensively awful and swiftly cancelled after just two episodes.  Hawley also created The Unusuals and wrote for Bones (two solid series), so hopefully My Generation was an aberration.  Warren Littlefield—another man whose last project was, damningly, My Generation—will also executive produce.

MGM TV filmed a Fargo pilot with no Coen participation in 1997 with Edie Falco in the lead role.  I doubt Falco will return, but you have to figure the wiles of the Coen brothers and FX will lure a great cast to the series.  Hit the jump to watch the trailer for Fargo.

We’re more than happy to report all things Coen Brothers, but I’ll admit the first photos from the set of Inside Llewyn Davis were pretty dull.  I love signage as much as the next guy, but now we’ve got some good set photos to show you.  The new images show off lead actors Oscar Isaac, Carey Mulligan, and Justin Timberlake, and the male cast members have gone bearded.  The film is set in 1960s Greenwich folk scene, so the actors look period-appropriate.  I’m not sure why Isaac is carrying around a cat, but I’m sure the cat digs his beard.  Cats love beards almost as much as they like Internet memes.

Hit the jump to check out the set photos.  The film also stars Garrett Hedlund, Stark Sands, and John Goodman.

The first set photos from the Coen Brothers’ Inside Llewyn Davis have gone online.  The film follows a young musician (Oscar Isaac) trying to make it in the 1960s Greenwich Village folk scene.  Filming is underway in Manhattan and the production has sent the shooting location back to the 60s.  It’s looking good, although the Coens could just charge onto the set of Mad Men and say “Everything here is ours now.  Our Oscars trump your Emmys.”  This is a sound plan and I believe Joel and Ethan Coen should seriously consider it.

Hit the jump to check out the set photos.  The film also stars Carey Mulligan, Justin Timberlake, Garrett Hedlund, Stark Sands, and John Goodman.

While many were skeptical about an English-language remake of Park Chan-wook’s Oldboy when it was announced, things got interesting when Spike Lee signed on to direct. Then the director locked Josh Brolin as his star and many fans’ fears (mine included) were abased. The next question was who Lee would choose to play the incredibly nasty villain, as the crux of the movie hinges on the dichotomy between the protagonist and the antagonist. Rumors began to surface that Colin Firth, an odd yet exciting choice, had been offered the role.

There reports were unconfirmed at the time, but Steve recently sat down with Firth to talk about the upcoming spy thriller Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, and he confirmed that he’s been approached about the role but no decisions have been made just yet. In addition, the actor talked about his recently wrapped remake of the 1966 caper comedy Gambit. The film also stars Cameron Diaz and Stanely Tucci, and was written by Joel and Ethan Coen. Hit the jump to check out the interview.

British actress Carey Mulligan is certainly on an enviable role. Fresh off of critical acclaim for Drive, she has the haunting NC-17 drama Shame out in December, and she’s currently filming Baz Luhrmann’s 3D adaptation of The Great Gatsby in Australia. Once done there, she’s not slowing down any, as she will start shooting Inside Llewyn Davis (a musician trying to make it in the 1960′s New York folk scene) for the Coen brothers, and then do the new untitled Spike Jonze project from a Charlie Kaufman screenplay that reportedly centers on world leaders who unite to discuss cataclysmic events such as oil prices and wars.

While she was in L.A. recently, Collider got the opportunity to speak with Mulligan about her current and upcoming projects, how outrageously lucky she feels about working with such incredible talent, in front of and behind the camera, how extraordinary it is to be in a Baz Luhrmann film, her audition with Gatsby star Leonardo DiCaprio, how the Coen brothers are her favorite filmmakers and that she can’t believe she gets to be one of their characters, and that she couldn’t refuse the opportunity to work with Spike Jonze. Check out what she had to say after the jump:

The Coen brothers have signed on to executive produce HarveKarbo, a potential series they co-created with Phil Johnston (Cedar Rapids).  THR describes the premise: “[HarveKarbo] revolves around a touchy Los Angeles private investigator — and his deadbeat friends in El Segundo — whose cases frequently force him to cross paths with a who’s who of Hollywood.”  Imagine TV is shepherding the project through development with 20th Century Fox Television; Imagine head Brian Grazer is the man credited enticing the endlessly lauded brothers to a smaller screen.

While the last few years have seen respected filmmakers like Frank Darabont (The Walking Dead) and Diablo Cody (The United States of Tara) dive head on into a TV schedule, the Coens likely have no interest in keeping up with the daily demand of a broadcast series.  Instead, expect the J.J. Abrams model: get the show off the ground, then hand the reins to a collaborator—in this case, Johnston.  Even such speculation is getting ahead of ourselves.  Fox has awarded the hourlong single-camera comedy a script commitment, but HarveKarbo has a long road through the competitive pilot season before any potential series order.  That said, it would be pretty cool to see “Executive Produced by Joel and Ethan Cohen” in a credits sequence every week.

After dishing out a new film every year for the past year, 2011 will be Coen-less.  But that doesn’t mean the Oscar-winning brothers aren’t at work on their next project.  As we reported over the summer, Joel and Ethan Coen are working on a “music-intensive” project and that the film would be “loosely based one of the 1960s Greenwich Valley folk scene’s most revered names: Dave Van Ronk.”  Variety now reports that the film will be entitled Inside Llewyn Davis and “centers around Llewyn Davis’ struggles as a folk musician during the genre’s 1960s heyday in New York City.”  That pretty much follows what we had heard thus far and it sounds pretty great.  The Coens have heavily used bluegrass (O Brother, Where Are Thou?) and gospel (The Ladykillers) in the past and I can’t wait to see what they do with folk music.

On a related note, the Coen Brothers will reteam with producer Scott Rudin while Studio Canal will co-finance and handle international sales for the flick.  Rudin previously worked with the Coens on No Country for Old Men and True Grit and that worked out pretty well.  Now that there’s financing, hopefully this film will speed into production and we can get our next Coen film by 2012.

One of my favorite cinematographers is Roger Deakins.  If you look over his amazing resume, you’ll see he’s shot so many memorable films, you’d be hard pressed to have not seen at least a few of them.  Some of the standouts include The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, No Country for Old Men, The Big Lebowski, The Shawshank Redemption, and True Grit. As you may have noticed by the titles I just listed, Deakins has a very close relationship with the Coen Brothers, as he shoots most of their movies.

The other day I got to do an exclusive phone interview with Deakins and we talked about a wide range of subjects: what kinds of cameras and lenses he likes to use, his relationship with the Coen brothers and how they work together, making True Grit, digital vs. film, his next movie Now which he shot digitally with the Arriflex Alexa (his first time using digital), his relationship with DreamWorks and his involvement on How to Train Your Dragon and the upcoming sequel, 3D, and when I asked him about what’s coming up next, he said, “I’ll probably do a film with Sam Mendes next.”  When I asked him if that meant he was shooting Bond 23, he said, “it might, yeah.”

If you’re interested in cinematography, or just a fan of Deakins work, hit the jump to either read or listen to our conversation:

If you’ve seen the Coen Brothers awesome movie True Grit, then you saw Barry Pepper’s great work as Lucky Ned Pepper towards the end of the film.  However, if you haven’t seen the movie, I won’t spoil anything in this intro other than saying True Grit is a fantastic movie and Pepper literally disappears in the role.  Of course, as a fan of this very talented actor, this didn’t surprise me as he’s been doing great work for years.  Check out his full resume.

Anyway, before True Grit got released, I sat down with Pepper for an exclusive interview.  While I usually like to post interviews before a movie gets released, I decided to save this one till after it had been playing for a little while.  During the interview he talked about how he got involved in the movie, what it was like to work with the amazing cast, and the Coen Brothers.  In addition, Pepper recently wrapped on Terrence Malick’s next movie (which stars Ben Affleck) and he told me how he got cast and how he never read a script.  He also said that he still doesn’t know what the movie is about and described the unusual way Malick worked.  If you’re a fan of either the Coen Brothers or Terrence Malick, hit the jump to either read or listen to some great stories:

The Coen Brothers are known for injecting a heavy dose of quirky humor throughout their films, but it seems their dry wit extends to the end credit sequence as well: Buster Coen, the 15-year-old son of writer/director Ethan Coen, was listed as “Mr. Damon’s abs double” on their latest Western masterpiece, True Grit. That job title may raise confusion for those of you who checked out the film-Damon’s character LaBoeuf is never sans shirt-or have ever seen any of Damon’s body…of work (outside of The Informant! pictured above).  Scott Feinberg brought the easter egg to Damon’s attention at a Q&A screening, but he was fully aware and accepting of the Coens’ inside joke. Apparently Buster served as an assistant to the Script Supervisor and requested he be listed under a job that carries a little more weight-or muscle-on set. As if you needed an excuse this thin, there’s now one more reason to see True Grit again before it rides out of theaters.

Last month, we reported that director Michael Hoffman (The Last Station) had come on board to helm the Coen Brothers-scripted remake of the 1966 Michael Caine caper comedy Gambit.  Deadline now reports that Oscar nominee Colin Firth is in talks to play the Caine role of a cat burglar who attempts to steal a priceless statue from a billionaire by enlisting the help of a waitress (played in the original by Shirley MacLaine) who looks like the billionaire’s deceased wife.

Firth, who is likely to receive an Oscar nomination for his wonderful performance in The King’s Speech, is currently developing a film based on the Amanda Knox murder case with director Michael Winterbottom (The Killer Inside Me), and is co-starring in Tomas Alfredson’s Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.

Paramount has released 4 movie clips and about 4 minutes of behind the scenes footage from the Coen Brothers True Grit.  Based on Charles Portis’ novel, the film stars Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon, Josh Brolin, Barry Pepper and newcomer Hailee Steinfeld.  As I said a few weeks ago in my mini-review and video blog, I absolutely loved this movie and think it’s one of the best of the year.  I also think this is one of those films that will stand the test of time.  Of course, being directed by the Coen Brothers, does that really surprise anyone?

Anyway, if you can’t wait till Christmas Day, hit the jump for some clips and the behind the scenes footage:

Continuing with our series of interviews with the cast of TRON: Legacy, if you’re a fan of Jeff Bridges, you’re in the right place.  That’s because at the Los Angeles press junket, I got to participate in a roundtable interview with “The Dude” and he talked about the new technology that was used to make Tron, how he prepared to play both Kevin Flynn and Clu, how he decides which project to take, his upcoming album and tour with T-Bone Burnett, the Coen Brothers, and a lot more.  Hit the jump to either read or listen to the interview:

In the late 90′s, I used to watch Pedro Martinez pitch for the Boston Red Sox.  While he’d always been a decent pitcher, starting in ’97, he was in the zone, striking out batters with such ease that everyone knew they were watching something special.  It got to be that his dates on the mound were circled on calendars and people cleared their schedules to make sure they could watch.

Which brings me to the latest Coen Brothers movie, True Grit.

For the past few years, moviegoers have been witness to an incredible streak of brilliant movies from the Coens, starting with No Country For Old Men in 2007, and continuing with Burn After Reading, A Serious Man, and now their latest work of genius, True Grit.  Like Pedro Martinez in the 90′s, the brothers are throwing fastball after fastball and they’re making it look far too easy.  And they’re doing it every year.  If you’re a movie nerd, you know how difficult it is to make one great movie, let alone four in four years.  Much more after the jump: