Quote of the Day

"It’s a love story between two men set in the 30s that has explicit sexual content that or at least it challenges you with the sexual relationship between these two men. One is a Native American character and one is a corrupt cop in LA. It’s set in the 30s. They have to flee L.A. ultimately and go to Mexico. But it’s a love story and with a strong sexual component. And what was so remarkable is that it all started with Joaquin having some ideas and some thoughts and just questions and images. And he came to me and said, “Does this connect to you at all?” And I was like, “Yeah, this is really interesting.” And so we would just be on the phone talking and it developed into a script... [Joaquin] He had fragments of ideas and then I started to formulate them into an actual narrative. And then I brought my wonderful, brilliant friend John Raymond, with whom I collaborated with on “Mildred Pierce” into the process. Basically it was just this wonderful, organic way to create the script. And Joaquin was pushing it further into more dangerous territory, sexually."

That is the legendary Todd Haynes, director of Far From Heaven and Velvet Goldmine and Carol and the forthcoming (opening NYFF in a few weeks!) May December, dropping the deets on his next project, a "sexually explicit" gay romance starring Joaquin Phoenix, to Variety. Read the whole thing here, although the rest of it is mainly about May December and you might not want to read all of that if you are like me and haven't seen that movie yet. I find it super interesting that Joaquin is being all, "Gimme some gay sex, Todd!" But then I remember who his brother was...

... and it's maybe not so weird. Has Joaquin played gay before? Now that I think about it -- wasn't he in talks to do Brokeback back in the day? Anyway good for him, get that dick, Joaquin. I'm sure Rooney won't mind. Todd does say they don't know who will play the Native American half of the couple -- that they'll probably find an unknown -- but Todd, Todd, Todd! Martin Sensmeier is standing right there! (See my big post on Martin Sensmeier right here.) Somebody get Martin Sensmeier's agent Todd Haynes' phone number immediately!