Ben Affleck’s Live By Night and Clint Eastwood’s Jersey Boys get release dates

So, Ben Affleck is going to have a very busy 2014. Not only will he be appearing in BATMAN VS SUPERMAN as The Dark Knight, but he will also be directing LIVE BY NIGHT, the historical drama he has been developing at Warner Bros. According to Deadline, Affleck is expected to begin filming LIVE BY NIGHT in September in anticipation of a December 25, 2015 release date. This likely means that filming on Zack Snyder‘s MAN OF STEEL sequel will begin early next year and then Affleck will slide behind the camera for LIVE BY NIGHT right after.

LIVE BY NIGHT comes from the book by Dennis Lehane who wrote the source material for Affleck’s directorial debut, GONE BABY GONE. It is a sprawling epic crime story that will be the biggest project in Affleck’s career renaissance:

A cop’s son falls in with bad guys and becomes one. But in Lehane’s hands, the Prohibition-era tale of Joe Coughlin’s rise to criminal power is both fresh and nuanced, packed with guns, booze, and babes as it roars from Boston to Tampa to Cuba. As Coughlin crosses deeper into the dark side–among those who “live by night and dance fast”–he provokes the question that sustains this propulsive narrative: Can a man be a good mobster and a good person at the same time?

I am a big fan of Affleck’s recent career and look forward to both LIVE BY NIGHT and BATMAN VS SUPERMAN. Another actor turned director that I am fond of is Clint Eastwood who will try his hand at a musical with the adaptation of JERSEY BOYS. That film now has a release date of June 20, 2014. Eastwood has tackled various types of films over the decades from westerns to war films to dramas and even comedies. But a musical would be a change of pace for him.

It is presented in a documentary-style format that dramatizes the formation, success and eventual break-up of the 1960s rock ‘n roll group The Four Seasons. The musical is structured as four “seasons”, each narrated by a different member of the band who gives his own perspective on its history and music. Songs include “Big Girls Don’t Cry”, “Sherry”, “December 1963 (Oh, What A Night)”, “My Eyes Adored You”, “Stay”, “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You”, “Working My Way Back to You” and “Rag Doll”, among others. The title refers to the fact that the members of The Four Seasons are from New Jersey.

The cast of JERSEY BOYS is mostly unknowns aside from BOARDWALK EMPIRE’s Vincent Piazza and Christopher Walken, but I have come to expect the unexpected from Eastwood. The 83-year-old never ceases to impress with what he is able to pull off on the big screen. There haven’t been many good musical films in the last couple of years (ahem, ROCK OF AGES), but Clint Eastwood instills a little more faith than other directors.