I love submarine movies, and I can’t figure out why they’re so rare.  They’re inherently claustrophobic, you don’t need many sets, there’s fantastic use of sound and silence, actors have room to deliver terrific performances, and if the sub is equipped with a nuclear warhead, then the stakes can’t be higher.  What’s not to like?  Submarines also have a great sense of mystery since there’s no way to see what’s outside once the ship is submerged.  Writer-director Todd Robinson tries to tap into that mystery in his new film, Phantom, but he stumbles over his clumsy attempts to hide his characters’ pasts and motives.  Thankfully, removed from the mystery, Phantom is a tense submarine picture featuring strong performances, and an understanding of the genre’s dramatic assets.

Inspired by true events, Phantom is a Cold War era suspense thriller about a Soviet submarine captain, named Dmitri “Demi” Zubov (Ed Harris), forced to lead a covert mission that could start a nuclear war.  With replacement sailors filling in for many of his regular crew, the captain quickly learns that the real mission is to launch a missile strike against the Americans while making it appear to come from a Chinese vessel, triggering a nuclear showdown between the two superpowers and forcing the men aboard to make impossible choices that could end their lives.

While at the film’s press day, actor David Duchovny spoke to Collider for this exclusive interview about what made him want to get involved with this project, the decision the director made to have his cast avoid using Russian accents, that the technical dialogue comes easy for him and has since his days on The X-Files, how challenging it was to work on a real submarine and do fight scenes without getting hurt, and how great it was to work with Ed Harris.  He also talked about how he would be surprised if Season 7 weren’t the last season of his Showtime series Californication, and that they’ve been finishing each season as it was going to be their last, for the last three years now.  Check out what he had to say after the jump.

The first trailer and poster for the period submarine thriller Phantom have been released online.  The film stars Ed Harris as the captain of a Cold War Soviet submarine who, after being rushed into a classified mission, discovers that his submarine is being taken over by a rogue KGB group.  David Duchovny plays the leader of the KGB group, and this trailer looks like it may just give away the entire plot of the film.  We haven’t seen a good submarine thriller in quite a long time, so here’s hoping Phantom delivers.

Hit the jump to watch the trailer and check out the poster.  Written and directed by Todd Robinson (Lonely Hearts), the film also stars William Fichtner, Lance Henriksen, Sean Patrick Flanery, and Jason Beghe.  Phantom opens on March 1, 2013.

With the American Film Market getting ready to begin, expect plenty of casting stories over the next week.  The latest such announcement comes via Deadline, who reports that David Duchovny, Hope Davis (American Splendor, The Newsroom), and Academy Award-winner Timothy Hutton are set to star in the drama After the Fall.  Based on a true story, the film centers on two parents grieving over the unexpected death of their daughter who are inspired to build “a world class state of the art children’s hospital where families are welcomed into the healing process.”  The result was Maria Fareri Children’s Hospital in New York’s Hudson Valley.

Carroll Cartwright (What Maise Knew) wrote the script, and Anthony Fabian (Skin) is onboard to direct.  Duchovny and Davis will play the parents, with Hutton set to portray the man who helped them obtain the funds for the new hospital.  Production is currently underway in Connecticut.

The indie comedy Goats, based on Mark Poirier’s best-selling novel, tells the story of Ellis (Graham Phillips), a 15-year-old looking to find his place among his eccentric family.  His mom (Vera Farmiga) is a New Age hippie that spends all of her time working on self-help rituals with her hustler boyfriend (Justin Kirk), while his dad (Ty Burrell) left home years ago and is more focused on his new wife (Keri Russell) and family.  And then, there’s Goat Man (David Duchovny), the goat-herding sage who has lived in their pool house since Ellis was a child, teaching him the meaning of expanding one’s mind.

At the film’s press day, actor Graham Phillips spoke to Collider for this exclusive interview about the long road to getting this film made (including the role of Goat Man being recast with Kevin Kline, at one point), how much fun he had exploring a teenaged character with so much substance, the biggest challenges in working with the goats, what it’s been like to grow up with his character on the CBS drama series The Good Wife, why he wants to be picky about the roles he takes, and his desire to also write and direct.  Check out what he had to say after the jump.

The indie comedy Goats, from director Christopher Neil and based on Mark Poirier’s best-selling novel, tells the story of Ellis (Graham Phillips), a 15-year-old looking to find his place among his eccentric family.  His mom (Vera Farmiga) is a New Age hippie that spends all of her time working on self-help rituals with her hustler boyfriend (Justin Kirk), while his dad (Ty Burrell) left home years ago and is more focused on his new wife (Keri Russell) and family.  And then, there’s Goat Man (David Duchovny), the goat-herding sage who has lived in their pool house since Ellis was a child, teaching him the meaning of expanding one’s mind.

At the film’s press day, actor David Duchovny spoke to Collider for this exclusive interview about how he approached the role of Goat Man, what interested him about the unique character, how he came to the specific look, what it was like to experience a goat trek, the challenges of working with real goats, and the difference in playing one character over a long period of time, like he does on Californication, versus a finite time with film.  He also talked about his interest in doing a third The X-Files film, and where he thinks the second film, The X-Files: I Want to Believe, went wrong.  Check out what he had to say after the jump.

Earlier today, I had the opportunity to sit down with David Duchovny at the members-only Soho House in West Hollywood to chat about his indie feature Goats.  In the comedy, he plays Goat Man, a goat-herding sage who has lived with Ellis (Graham Phillips) and his New Age hippie mother (Vera Farmiga) since Ellis was a child, teaching him the meaning of expanding one’s mind.

While we will run the full interview tomorrow, we did want to share what Duchovny had to say about the possibility of a third The X-Files movie, especially after what writer/producer Frank Spotnitz told me about it a week ago.  Clearly up for it, he said that he doesn’t understand why Fox isn’t more enthusiastic to get it going, when it’s a homegrown action franchise that they own, and he talked about where he thinks the second film went wrong.  Check out what he had to say after the jump.

The first trailer for the indie comedy Goats has landed online.  Directed by Christopher Neil,  the film is based on the novel of the same name by Mark Jude Poirier and tells the coming of age story of a 15-year-old boy (Graham Phillips) who moves from his new age mother’s (Vera Farmiga) South-Western home to an East Coast prep school where his estranged father (Ty Burrell) was once a star student.  The trailer isn’t particularly funny, and David Duchovy is quite strange as the goat-llving beau of Farmiga’s character.  Matt caught the film earlier this year at Sundance and wasn’t a big fan (you can read his review here).

Hit the jump to watch the trailer.  The film also stars Keri Russell, Ty Burell and Justin Kirk.  Goats opens on August 10th.

Today’s poster round-up features comedy, action and horror.  What more could you want?

• The Campaign, starring Will Ferrell and Zach Galifianakis as political opponents, opens August 10th.
• Goats, based on the Mark Jude Poirier novel and starring David Duchovny and Vera Farmiga, also opens August 10th.
• Premium Rush, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt as a bike messenger with a volatile delivery, opens August 24th.
• The Tall Man, a horror mystery starring Jessica Biel and Jodelle Ferland, opens August 31st.

Hit the jump to check out the posters and synopses.

While HBO made some big cuts from their original programming towards the end of last year, Showtime is keeping shows around as EW has learned that the cable network has given an additional season order to Shameless, House of Lies and Californication. Shameless gets a third season after its stellar ensemble cast, including William H. Macy and Emmy Rossum, has come through with a great second season while House of Lies, with Don Cheadle and Kristen Bell, has gotten stellar ratings to earn a second season while its first season is still in progress. Finally Californication is still going strong to nab a sixth season, but I don’t know if it will last beyond that. Either way, it shows that Showtime has faith in their shows and should please fans of all three series.

I don’t really care if teenagers learn life lessons anymore.  The coming-of-age genre has become as stolid as the rom-com, but the coming-of-age movies still get a pass because they’re done under the auspices of being indie and artistic.  Goats makes an odd trade-off for the genre.  The movie doesn’t pack its main character full of quirks, but instead of growing as a person, he goes from a mostly-boring kid to a completely-boring kid.  All the quirks are for the one-dimensional characters who have almost no impact on his life.  The only fascinating thing about Goats is the values it preaches.

Today, the 2012 Sundance Film Festival announced their premieres line-up. Along with the announcement comes a boat load of images from the films set to be showcased at the fest. After the jump we’ve got images and syonpses from Celeste and Jesse Forever (starring Andy Samberg, Rashida Jones, and Elijah Wood), Lay the Favorite (starring Rebecca Hall, Bruce Willis, and Catherine Zeta-Jones), GOATS (starring David Duchovny, Vera Farmiga, and Ty Burrell), and Shadow Dancer (starring Andrea Riseborough, Gillian Anderson, and Clive Owen).

The 2012 Sundance Film Festival runs from January 19 – 29th.

David Duchovy has joined the cast of the indie thriller Phantom. The film is set on a Soviet submarine during the Cold War and stars Ed Harris, William Fichtner, and Natascha McElhone. Variety reports that Duchovny is replacing Andy Garcia as the leader of the Soviet Special Forces team who is forced to head up a mission cloaked in secrecy. Todd Robinson (White Squall) wrote the script and is directing the indie which will shoot next month in Long Beach, California. RCR Media is co-financing and producing the flick, with Sony Pictures Worldwide handling domestic distribution. Duchovny recently wrapped the latest season of Showtime’s Californication and the indie comedy Goats.

Though the premiere of the fourth season just happened this past Sunday, apparently the debut was impressive enough to warrant Showtime to renew Californication for a fifth season. In the series David Duchovny stars as Hank Moody, a struggling writer who constantly deals with the consequences of his inability to say “no” to drugs, sex and alcohol, while trying to show his family that he can be a good, responsible man. Keep tuning in to Showtime’s fourth season of Californication on Sundays at 9/8c. Any fans happy about the news?

David Duchovny, Vera Farmiga, Keri Russell, Minnie Driver, and Will Arnett have joined Ty Burrell and Graham Phillips (Evan Almighty) in Christopher Neil’s indie comedy Goats.  The film is based on the novel of the same name by Mark Jude Poirier (Smart People).  With the exception of Duchovny, this is a very different cast than the one that was attached a year ago, which according to The Playlist, included Hopper Penn, Robin Wright, Josh Brolin, Jason Schwartzman, and Robert Schwartzman.  Here’s the synopsis from the press release:

The coming of age story follows 15 year-old, Ellis (Phillips) as he moves from Wendy, his flakey, new age mother’s (Farmiga) South-Western home to an East Coast prep school where his estranged father Frank (Burrell) was once a star student.  For Ellis, this means leaving behind the only real dad he has ever known, Goat Man (Duchovny), his pot-smoking, goat herding mentor, and ultimately needing to evaluate his new prep school lifestyle that’s in stark contrast to his stoner upbringing.  Rounding out the cast are Keri Russell as Frank’s new wife, Minnie Driver as Wendy’s best friend and yogic advisor Johanna, and Will Arnett as Wendy’s boyfriend Bennett.

Hit the jump for the full press release.  Filming is set to begin in February.