'X-Men: First Class' Star Caleb Landry Jones To Lead Brandon Cronenberg's 'Antiviral'

Sarah Gadon, Malcolm McDowell, Douglas Smith, Matt Watts & James Cade Also On Board

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Update: THR reveals that Sarah Gadon (who is in David Cronenberg‘s “Cosmopolis“), Malcolm McDowell, Douglas Smith, Matt Watts and James Cade are also on board.

We recently heard about Brandon Cronenberg‘s planned directorial debut, “Antiviral,” which would see him follow in the footsteps of his famous father, David, with a sci-fi-tinged drama that he wrote and will direct.

Well, it looks like Cronenberg now has an actor to lead his feature film. Caleb Landry Jones, who played Banshee in Matthew Vaughn‘s “X-Men: First Class,” is on board to play “a salesman for a clinic that replicates celebrity diseases for public consumption.” Sound twisted? What did you expect from a Cronenberg?

The film was previously also revealed to be “set in a near future world very similar to our own” and will tackle the idea of Celebrity as Jones’s lead “becomes obsessed with a celebrity and injects himself with her disease, then must figure out how to cure it before time runs out.” Niv Fichman (“Hobo With A Shotgun“) will produce through Rhombus Media, with lensing set to begin this month in Toronto.

After famously debuting as “Boy on bike” at the end of the Coens’ “No Country For Old Men,” Landry Jones is certainly shaping up to be talent to keep tabs on. While juggling fare like this, the actor will next be seen in the bustling Hollywood actioner “Contraband” — the Mark Wahlberg-led remake of an Icelandic movie of the same name. The first poster for the film, which is duct-taped together, has now been unveiled and admirably advertises everything we imagine the film will be: a no-nonsense action flick. Our interest is slightly piqued by the supporting cast, which features Giovanni Ribisi, Ben Foster, J.K. Simmons and Kate Beckinsale. It opens on January 13, 2012.
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