November 8, 2004

Jared Leto's high-profile career in American show biz has been twice as long as Colin Farrell's… and in the second half of that career, the last five years - since Farrell broke out in Tigerland - Jared's made half the number of films that Colin has.

The two men star as the closest of friends, allies, comrades, brothers, lovers and just plain men in Oliver Stone's upcoming Alexander, which I will review when we are closer to the November 24 release date. But at the center of Stone's view of the epic warrior is a man who is driven by pride, demons and a responsibility to his personal history, played by Mr. Farrell. And by his side, the one person he can truly trust, is Hephaestion, played by Mr. Leto.

What is so striking about both men is that you know within moments that these are people who you want to see succeed in the insanity that is Hollywood. Each seems to be coming from someplace completely different than so many of the actors you run into.

Farrell has had a high intensity run, but he makes choices that are wildly imaginative, for instance, segueing from Terrence Malick's The New World to the role of Sonny Crockett in a big screen version of Miami Vice. There are not many actors who could carry a film like Phone Booth and then show up in an extended cameo full of malevolent charm in a tiny (but terrific) film like Intermission.

Leto has taken a rather different road. Marked as a quiet pretty boy in his breakout role on TV's My So Called Life, Leto proved to be a lot more in his role as Steve Prefontaine in "the other" movie about Pre. (Billy Crudup starred in the other one.) He joined the Fight Club and returned with David Fincher to the Panic Room. He got his time in with Malick on The Thin Red Line. He found perhaps his most important role in Darren Aronofsky's Requiem For A Dream. And now, Oliver Stone. That's a lot of top directors since Malick six years ago.

Coming by noon, pst… Chatting With The Guys…

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