HBO’s ‘The Sunset Limited’ Trailer: Two Old Guys, One Room

Pop quiz, everyone -- if you were locked in a room with Samuel L. Jackson, what would you do? Well, if you’re Tommy Lee Jones in HBO Film’s adaptation of The Sunset Limited, you’d have decided that a chat about the meaning of life and existence of God was just the thing.

Before he gets back in the habit of kicking some extraterrestrial butt on the big screen in Men in Black 3, Jones will show up on the small screen in Sunset Limited, which now has an official trailer.

Pulitzer Prize-winner and acclaimed American novelist Cormac McCarthy (No Country For Old Men, The Road) adapted his original one-setting, dialogue-driven play The Sunset Limited for this HBO production. Jones and Jackson star as two nameless characters (referred to as “White” and “Black” in McCarthy’s original teleplay) who occupy opposite ends of the theological spectrum: Jones plays an atheistic professor and Jackson portrays an ex-convict/evangelical Christian.

White’s attempt to kill himself by jumping in front of a train called The Sunset Limited was thwarted by Black, who thereafter escorted the suicidal teacher to his home in a poorer region of New York. Both the original play and movie adaptation take place entirely within the confines of Black’s rundown but sufficient apartment.

Watch the trailer for The Sunset Limited below:

Jones was also at the helm of HBO’s Sunset Limited, his third round in the director’s chair after the western novel-turned-TV movie The Good Old Boys and the well-received 2005 indie theatrical feature, The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada. The scenery may be far more basic in Jones’ latest film, but it boasts some truly poetic, nuanced prose penned by McCarthy instead. (SIDENOTE: Jones and McCarthy also happen to be friends, a connection of note for the often reclusive author.)

Sunset Limited looks to also feature some darkly humorous moments, courtesy of Jones playing his trademark no-nonsense persona off Jackson’s penchant for theatricality. Watching the two grizzled veterans of the screen in action together should be well worth it -- just don’t expect Jackson to chain up his costar to a radiator (a la Christina Ricci in Black Snake Moan) this time around.

The Sunset Limited premieres on HBO on Saturday, February 12th at 9 p.m. EST.

Source: HBO Films

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