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'Once' Director John Carney to Helm 'Dogs of Babel' with Steve Carell

by Ethan Anderton
November 2, 2011
Source: 24 Frames

Now that the former star of "The Office" doesn't have to worry about the NBC comedy series filling up his schedule, there are plenty of films with Steve Carell on the way. From Burt Wonderstone pitting him against Jim Carrey to a new drama called Foxcatcher that has him shooting Channing Tatum to death, and even another project with the directors of Crazy, Stupid, Love, it looks like Carell will be quite busy over the next few years. Now 24 Frames reports a project we heard about last February, an adaptation of Dogs of Babel that Carell will produce and star in, has now landed Once director John Carney to helm the film.

Based on Carolyn Parkhurst's novel, the story follows a linguistics professor (Carell) who discovers his wife dead in the backyard. Though the police rule the woman's death an accident, the professor is not convinced. Deducing that the only witness to his wife's death is the family dog, the man attempts to teach the canine to talk in hopes of learning what really caused his wife's death. This premise sounds like a wacky comedy at first, but I can easily see this turning out to be just as harrowing and hard-hitting a drama as The Beaver, which is still one of my favorite films of the year. And with Once director John Carney on board, this will undoubtedly have a very intimate style and tone that should let Carell shine as a dramatic actor as well.

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