Robert Pattinson Replaces Colin Farrell in David Cronenberg’s Cosmopolis

Let’s look at the different career paths of the two major male stars from Twilight. Taylor Lautner is doing what seems to be boilerplate action/tentpole stuff: Abduction and possibly Stretch bloody Armstrong. Robert Pattinson, meanwhile, is going a little more high-minded, co-starring with Cristoph Waltz in Water For Elephants and now taking over for Colin Farrell in David Cronenberg‘s adaptation of the Don DeLillo novel Cosmopolis. I know which actor I can respect more, without question. But what does this mean for the dedicated David Cronenberg fan?

I expect a lot of Cronenberg fans just exhaled a sad or exasperated sigh, for starters. I’ll admit that my own interest in Cosmopolis just took a dive. It’s a weird situation, where I can really respect Robert Pattinson for taking the gig, but him doing so really seems to ding the movie’s potential.

But what the hell; I’ve trusted Cronenberg for years and I’ll trust him again now. In the same way that I hope John Hillcoat can do a little technical rehab on Shia LeBeouf in The Wettest County in the World, I’m hoping that Cosmopolis will be a vessel to break Mr. Pattinson out of his Twilight mode. (And, to be fair, the Twilight films are hardly a venue in which to judge an actor — they’re so specific, and so dumb, that I think they could make even Daniel Day-Lewis look terrible.)

Pattinson will be onscreen a great deal in this film. Cosmopolis is about a whizkid financial guy — presumably a much more dynamic role than Twilight offers — and takes place almost entirely in a limo that is transporting him across the city during the course of a day. Other cast is attached (Marion Cotillard) or in talks (Paul Giamatti). No confirmation on those names yet, or on additional cast members.

Meanwhile, how big of a Total Recall fan — or a paycheck fan — is Colin Farrell to choose Len Wiseman’s new Total Recall over working with David Cronenberg? I like Farrell a lot, and think he’s made some interesting and generally good choices in his career. But this one is a serious WTF situation.


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