Steven Soderbergh is no stranger to star-studded heist movies. After scoring two separate Best Director Oscar nominations in the same year — he won for Traffic, beating himself for Erin Brockovich — the acclaimed filmmaker immediately segued to lighter fare, bring a good chunk of Hollywood to 2001’s blockbuster remake Ocean’s Eleven. Even after dropping out of Hollywood’s studio system, he did another stacked cast heist picture, with 2017’s semi-self-funded Logan Lucky. And now he’s planning a kind of heist of his own: He’s going to see if he can film another one of these big name crime movies in the midst of a pandemic (while, of course, conforming to COVID-19 shooting regulations).
As per The Hollywood Reporter, Soderbergh just started production on No Sudden Move, a period movie about small-time crooks whose latest job goes awry, as these things tend to do. It’s a movie Soderbergh has had in the works for a while now, and he was set to start shooting last spring. That, of course, did not happen, and in the months of re-jiggering production that followed, he lost some big names, namely George Clooney, John Cena, and Sebastian Stan. He has retained some other famous faces: Don Cheadle, Benicio Del Toro, Amy Seimetz, and Jon Hamm.
And he’s gained some other stars. THR reports that the call sheet includes such luminaries as Kieran Culkin, David Harbour, Brendan Fraser, Bill Duke, and SMILF’s Frankie Shaw. Also on staff are Uncut Gems breakout Julia Fox and young A Quiet Place and Honey Boy actor Noah Jupe.
Here’s the plot, as per THR:
With a script by Ed Solomon, Sudden Move is set in 1955 Detroit and centers on a group of small-time criminals who are hired to steal what they think is a simple document. When their plan goes horribly wrong, their search for who hired them — and for what ultimate purpose — weaves them through all echelons of the race-torn, rapidly changing city.
The always busy Soderbergh was last seen with last year’s The Laundromat, another one with a who’s-who cast, including Meryl Streep doing double duty and Gary Oldman and Antonio Banderas as a pair of Greek Chorus hosts. Last week it was reported that The Knick, the turn-of-the-last-century hospital series he made mid-last decade, would be returning, but now in the hands of star André Holland and his Moonlight director Barry Jenkins.
(Via THR)