Deadline is reporting that The Hunger Games star Josh Hutcherson will be joining Paradise Lost, an upcoming film which tells the story of “Nick, a young surfer who visits his brother in Colombia and falls madly in love with a beautiful local girl called Maria. Their romance seems idyllic until he meets her uncle, Pablo Escobar.”
The young actor will be joining Benicio Del Toro who will be playing, you guessed it, Mr. Escobar. With a script penned by Life of Pi actor Andrea di Stefano and directed by him as well, Paradise Lost has drawn comparisons to The Last King of Scotland, which is certainly a good thing.
“The film will have a narrative structure in the vein of The Last King of Scotland, weaving Nick and Maria’s romance with Nick’s ambivalent and destructive relationship with Escobar,” said producer Dimitri Rassam.
Set to shoot in March, if nothing else, the film should give Josh Hutcherson another chance to flex his dramatic acting chops, which he definitely has. I’ve always enjoyed the actor’s work and it will be great to see him playing off a legend like Del Toro. It will also be interesting to see who takes on the role of Maria, now that the other two main characters have been cast with high profile stars. Could we see one of Hollywood’s top leading ladies land the part? Quite possibly.
So far, Paradise Lost seems promising. Like I said before, Hutcherson is more than capable of playing the part and who doesn’t like seeing Del Toro play a violent psychopath? He was great in a similar role in Savages and I can’t wait to see him take on the famous drug lord with Paradise Lost.
We’ll keep you posted on this one as more news arises but tell us, what do you think of Josh Hutcherson joining the film?