The Reluctant Fundamentalist is director Mira Nair’s latest meditation of her distinctive subject matter: the exploration of East-West interactions and relations.  The movie is based on Mohsin Hamid’s book of the same title and follows the story of Changez (Riz Ahmed), a young Pakistani Columbia grad pursuing his professional goals in the corporate scene of New York and living the American dream until terrorism strikes the United States on 9/11 and he is turned into the enemy.  Kiefer Sutherland stars as Jim Cross — the managing director of a high-end boutique Wall Street hedge fund company who hires Changez and becomes somewhat of a father figure to him. However, their relationship dissolves when a cultural divide forces Changez to choose between two vastly different worlds.

In this exclusive phone interview with Collider, actor Kiefer Sutherland talked about the complexity of his character and why he wanted to do the film.  He also gave an update on the status of the 24 movie and the Paul W.S. Anderson historical thriller Pompeii, in which he plays the villain.  Check out what he had to say after the jump.

FilmDistrict has acquired U.S. distribution rights for director Paul W.S. Anderson’s (Resident Evil, The Three Musketeers) upcoming disaster film Pompeii.  The story “follows an enslaved Celtic gladiator who falls in love with a noblewoman on the eve of a massive volcanic eruption that destroys Pompeii, an event that also brings him face-to-face with the man who slaughtered his family years earlier.”  Kit Harington stars as the gladiator, while the rest of the cast is filled out by Emily Browning (Sucker Punch), Jared Harris, Kiefer Sutherland, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje (Lost), Jessica Lucas (Evil Dead), and recent addition Carrie-Anne Moss.

The script was written by Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes, and production is currently underway in Toronto.  FilmDistrict has set Pompeii for release on February 28, 2014.  Hit the jump to read the full press release.

We’ve got a couple of casting stories to share this afternoon.  Briefly:

• Kiefer Sutherland is in talks to play the villain opposite Kit Harington (Game of Thrones) in Paul W.S. Anderson’s disaster epic Pompeii.
• Mark Duplass is joining Melissa McCarthy and Shirley MacLaine in the roadtrip comedy Tammy, which McCarthy will co-direct.
• Michael Angarano (Red State) is set to costar in the remake of Heat with Jason Statham.

Hit the jump for more details.

For fans of the Kiefer Sutherland TV Series 24, it has been a mighty long road towards the promised movie, but if Training Day director Antoine Fuqua, who was attached to the project since last year, has anything to say about it, the movie version may have now reached the end of the line.  Hit the jump for the full scoop on the 24 movie.

The first theatrical trailer for director Mira Nair’s (Monsoon Wedding) adaptation of the Mohsin Hamid novel The Reluctant Fundamentalist has been released online.  The film tells the story of a young Pakistani professor (Riz Ahmed) whose success as a businessman in America takes a turn following the events of 9/11.  The pic is told in a frame story, as Ahmed’s character is being interviewed after the fact in Lahore by an American journalist (Liev Schreiber) who is trying to uncover the truth behind a kidnapping.  The pic looks like a rather engaging thriller that also tackles some serious social issues that our nation faced in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.

Hit the jump to watch the trailer.  The film also stars Kiefer Sutherland and Kate Hudson.  The Reluctant Fundamentalist opens on April 26th.

We first heard about Married and Cheating last year, when Sarah Jessica Parker and Marissa Tomei were attached to star.  It’s taken a year or so for the rest of the cast to come together, but the project from writer/director Raymond De Felitta (City Island) is finally gaining traction.  Variety reports Parker is still on board to star opposite Brendan Fraser, while Kiefer Sutherland and Eva Longoria are in talks to join the cast. The story follows three couples who deal with “infidelity, deceit, and confusion.”  There is still room in the three couples for another female lead, but since the report does not mention Tomei, I bet she moved on.

Felitta will shoot Married and Cheating this summer for Magnet Media.  This is the first of six $10-$50 million productions financed through a $190 million fund set up by Magnet’s German arm. Michael London, Lauren Versel, and Janice Williams are producing along with Magnet’s Jeannette Buerling and Michelle Ohayon.

Fans eager to see the 24 movie get going are gonna have to wait a bit longer. While all signs pointed to the feature film adaptation of the popular Fox TV series going into production this spring, Deadline reports that 20th Century Fox has decided not to go forward with the film this year. Apparently budget issues are to blame, and the studio wasn’t convinced everything could be worked out in time to shoot the movie before star Kiefer Sutherland has to report back for the second season of his new series Touch this fall (if it’s renewed). Hit the jump for more, including the possibility of a film trilogy.

The new Fox drama Touch, debuting with a preview on January 25^th (prior to its March 19^th premiere), shows how seemingly unrelated people all over the world affect each other’s lives in ways that are both seen and unseen, known and unknown. From creator/writer Tim Kring (Heroes) and actor/executive producer Kiefer Sutherland, the series will follow widower and single father Martin Bohn (Sutherland), who learns that his emotionally challenged 11-year-old son, Jake (David Mazouz), possesses the ability to perceive the seemingly hidden patterns that connect every life on the planet and he figures out a way to communicate directly with his son through numbers instead of words.

While at the TCA Winter Press Tour, Kiefer Sutherland talked about how he came to be doing another television series so soon after 24, why he responded so deeply to this compelling idea, gave hints about where the series will go after the pilot, and said that he feels he’s relatively astute, when it comes to seeing connections in his own life. He also talked about the status of the 24 movie, that he expects to shoot it in late April or early May, that it will pick up within six months of the last episode, and that two hours will represent a 24-hour day. Check out what he had to say after the jump:

Today, at the Television Critics Association Winter Press Tour, actor/executive producer Kiefer Sutherland was in attendance to talk about his upcoming Fox drama series Touch, which debuts with a series preview on January 25^th, prior to its March 19^th premiere date. While we will later run what he had to say about his new TV project, illustrating the ways that science and spirituality intersect and showing that we are all interconnected and tied in invisible ways to those whose lives we are destined to alter and impact, we wanted to make sure to share his comments about the status of the 24 movie, which he hopes will shoot this Spring. Check out what he had to say after the jump:

A feature film adaptation of the Fox series 24 has been promised for quite some time now. Originally the plan was to head into the movie directly after the show’s final season, but it’s been a bit of a tough road to production with numerous stops and starts. Deadline now reports that things have picked back up once again and the goal is to start filming after star Kiefer Sutherland’s availability opens up next April. Fox passed on the original script by Billy Ray (Shattered Glass), but the latest draft by Mark Bomback (The Wolverine) is set to be turned in by the end of the year, after which the search will begin for a director.

Tony Scott was previously attached to direct, but he’s no longer involved. Producer Brian Grazer and the studio have “about five directors in mind” to take over the job, though Deadline doesn’t specify who they’re looking at. The original take had Jack Bauer heading to Europe, but we don’t know if Bomback’s take maintains that general plotline or takes the film in another direction. Whether or not this spring start date will stick is anyone’s guess, but as of now everyone’s favorite torturer seems poised to grace the silver screen sooner rather than later.

[This review is a re-print of my review from the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival]

Lars Von Trier‘s Melancholia opens in magnificent, operatic fashion. Birds fall from the sky, strands of light stream forth from the finger tips of Kirsten Dunst, the ground sinks beneath Charlotte Gainsbourg‘s feet and then a bigger planet obliterates our planet. This is all beautifully shot, set to classical music from a booming orchestra, and played in slow motion. It’s a prelude to the film’s big ideas, terrific performances, and thoughtful examination of what it means to be happy and if happiness is even worth pursing. But for all of its grandiosity and introspection, Melancholia never manages to strike an emotional connection.

After making waves with eight seasons of the action thriller series 24, actor Kiefer Sutherland and Fox are back together for what looks like a promising new drama series that I wish would’ve debuted this fall instead of next spring. From Heroes creator Tim Kring comes Touch, a drama about a widower (Sutherland) whose 11-year-old mute son is seeing patterns in numbers. But what does it all mean? Looking like a mix of Alex Proyas’ Knowing and the mythology of Kring’s aforementioned superhero drama on NBC, a new trailer released straight from Fox really makes Touch look like a promising addition to Fox’s dramatic line-up in 2012. After the jump you can see the trailer for yourself as well as the series’ official synopsis.

New posters have gone online for Steven Spielberg’s War Horse and Lars Von Trier’s Melancholia.  War Horse continues to be a tough sell mainly because the lead character is a horse and the horse doesn’t talk.  You can put Mr. Ed in your World War I drama, Mr. Spielberg, but a non-talking horse?  How will that play in Peoria?  At least the poster is pretty-looking.

As for Melancholia, it’s a collection of character posters plus one interesting addition.  Von Trier gets his own poster.  It’s the first time I’ve seen a director who wasn’t also an actor in the movie get his or her own character poster.  Of course, Von Trier is a bit of a character and his poster even bears a fake seal proclaiming “Official Persona non Grata – Cannes 2011″.  Hit the jump to check out the posters.  War Horse opens December 28th.  Melancholia hits OnDemand on October 7th and opens in theaters on November 11th.

The series was part of Fox’s upfronts presentation back in May, and now Fox has officially order 13 episodes of Touch, a new drama series starring Kiefer Sutherland, who makes his return to the network after eight seasons of 24. Tim Kring (Heroes) created the new series which will hit the air sometime in the spring of 2012. Director Francis Lawrence (Water for Elephants) is behind the pilot for the series which is said to have science and spirituality intersect with the hopeful premise that we are all interconnected, tied in invisible ways to those whose lives we are destined to alter and impact. David Mazouz, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, and Danny Glover also star. You can check out the full series synopsis after the jump.

Lars von Trier’s depression is well-documented. He’s a visionary plagued by his own personal demons. His fears and phobias have kept him out of the skies and the rush of international film promotion. In 2007 they even led him to say, “basically, I’m afraid of everything in life, except filmmaking.” His depression was so crippling, in fact, that it had made him “a blank sheet of paper” that year, unable to create. Luckily, his struggles did not keep him from the directorial chair. The self-proclaimed “melancholy Dane” returned to work and dug to the very depths of empathy with his harrowing Antichrist, and now he’s dared to display his emotional demons front and center with the apocalyptic Melancholia. My review after the jump: