Zack Braff's Garden State was

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Zack Braff's Garden State was shot in the winter-spring of '03, went to Sundance in January '04 and then was released by Fox Searchlight later that year. Braff did a Chicken Little voice-over and acted in Scrubs and then in Tony Goldwyn's The Last Kiss (due later this year from Paramount) but helming-wise it's been All Quiet on the Western Front. Now, finally, Braff is about to direct again -- a remake of Susanne Bier's Open Hearts for big Paramount. (Paramount exec Pam Abdy, a Garden State producer, will "shepherd" the untitled pic with Brad Weston.) The infidelity drama will shoot in New Jersey sometime this summer. The Hollywood Reporter's Tatiana Siegel and Borys Kit have written the story "revolves around two couples whose lives become intertwined after a devastating car crash." That's putting it obliquely. If Braff's film is anything like Bier's, it'll be about a doctor having an affair with the wife of a guy who's become a quadraplegic after an auto accident in which the injuring driver was...hang on...the doctor's wife. The affair is hot, mad and reckless...not to mention shameful and humiliating for the doctor after his wife gets wind of it along with his kids, leading to a complete mess all around. And then quadraplegic's wife changes her mind and blows him off. Unless Braff is just taking the bones of the Bier film and making it into something else entirely, forget those signature elements you liked so much in Garden State ("winsome," "charming," "GenX quirky"). This has the appearance of an artistic growth project for Braff...and I for one am very keen to see it.