Brad Furman‘s Runner Runner (20th Century Fox, 9.27) is basically Oliver Stone‘s Wall Street (’87) meets Ben Younger‘s Boiler Room (00) + Robert Luketic‘s 21 (’08). It’s Justin Timberlake as Charlie Sheen/Bud Fox and Ben Affleck as Michael Douglas/Gordon Gekko, more or less. Furman’s The Lincoln Lawyer (’11) was sturdy and satisfying, but we’ve definitely seen Runner Runner before.

If (and I say “if”) Carey Mulligan is firmly cast as Hillary Clinton in James Ponsoldt‘s Rodham (the script for which I reviewed a few days ago) Mulligan might want to (a) put on a few pounds or (b) wear prosthetics that give her a very slight chubby-cheek look. Clinton was never “heavy” but she had a roundish chipmunk face, and Mulligan is a tiny bit taller and has thinner, more delicate bones. If she wants to go all Robert De Niro and get it really right, she’ll start wolfing down the cheesburgers a month before filming begins or she’ll round herself off a la January Jones in Mad Men.

(l.) Hillary Rodham upon graduating from Yale University, age 21 or so; (r.) Carey Mulligan.

Now that Robert Redford is hot again with All Is Lost, it’s worth recalling his first stirring and commendable filmed performance. He played a kind and gentle-mannered Mr. Death in “Nothing In The Dark,” a 1962 Twilight Zone episode that was written by George Clayton Johnson and directed by Lamont Johnson. Redford’s big payoff (“Am I really so bad?”) begins around 7:45 and continues to the end. NITD is not some historic, rip-roaring teleplay, but it’s probably the most compassionate drama about death ever aired on American mainstream television. And R.G. Armstrong‘s performance as a kindly demolition man isn’t chopped liver either.

I’m partially agreeing with Rope of Silicon‘s Brad Brevet about the likeliest Best Actor contenders right now. Except, that is, for Nebraska‘s Bruce Dern, who won the Best Actor prize at last month’s Cannes Film Festival. I worship Dern and he’s quite good as Will Forte‘s snarly, partly deluded dad but it’s a Best Supporting Actor performance — the movie isn’t really about his journey as much as Forte’s. And BD’s performance is more about color and conviction than profound emotional spillage.

I also strongly suspect that other Best Actor nominees will arise out of David O. Russell‘s American Hustle (Christian Bale, Bradley Cooper or Jeremy Renner) and that Chiwetel (a.k.a. “Chewy”) Ejiofor will score with his lead performance in Steve McQueen‘s 12 Years A Slave.

Cannes buyers were shown footage (or maybe just this sizzle teaser) from Anton Corbijn‘s A Most Wanted Man and they didn’t bite. That’s because they sat and watched and said to each other in the blunt manner of F. Murray Abraham in Inside Llewyn Davis, “We don’t see a lot of money in this.” They see an austere, sombre, enticingly adult espionage drama in the vein of another Tinker Tailor Solder Spy — the kind of movie that guys like myself will probably love and which your average 20something, Man of Steel-anticipating, popcorn-munching sophisticate might rent on Netflix…maybe. Pic will undoubtedly play Toronto. Cheers to “Philly” Hoffman for delivering an excellent Armin Mueller-Stahl imitation.

I’d like to amend or expand upon my three-year-old “Losers and Long Showers” observation. It hit me earlier today that I was being too specific when I wrote that taking long showers “is a sign of weak character” and that “anyone who does this is a soft sister — a person looking to hide inside the warm amniotic fluid of his mother’s womb.” What I really meant is that hiders and losers don’t just waste time taking long showers — they spend lots of time in bathrooms.

So the new rule (and I’m not trying to be provocative for the sake of page views — I really feel this is true) is that the more bathroom time you put in on a daily basis the more afraid you are of the occasional sting and chill of life.

Update: “The Peter Berg film tested through the roof at both Archlight and before a blue-collar audience.” — Filmmaker friend who knows and hears stuff.

Earlier: I’m feeling a natural sense of caution and concern about Peter Berg‘s Lone Survivor, which Universal has decided to open on 12.27 in order to exploit possible award-season huzzahs. Pic is basically about a Zero Dark Thirty-type mission gone wrong — about a real-life Seal Team assassination attempt on 6.28.05 that didn’t pan out and in fact resulted in everyone on the squad getting wasted except one. Pic stars Mark Wahlberg with Taylor Kitsch, Eric Bana, Emile Hirsch and Ben Foster costarring. Problem #1, for me, is that Berg directed Battleship — one of the all-time worst spectacle-monster films ever made. Problem #2 is Kitsch, who has proved that he’s not that adept at conveying intelligent thought + he’s suffered through the triple-whammy of John Carter, Battleship and Savages. I hope he gets through this. I don’t hate the guy or anything. We all go through bad patches.

Has the critical tide has turned on Marc Forster and Brad Pitt‘s World War Z (Paramount, 6.21)? Will anyone at Paramount give o hoot if it has? World War Z is about as critic-proof as they come, but on a deep-down level the filmmakers want the approval of the critical elite, even if Paramount marketing execs are indifferent. In any event Scott Foundas‘s Variety rave indicates that other critics may follow suit…maybe.

“Rising from an early grave of negative pre-release publicity, director Marc Forster and producer-star Brad Pitt’s much-maligned World War Z emerges as a surprisingly smart, gripping and imaginative addition to the zombie-movie canon, owing as much to scientific disaster movies like The China Syndrome and Contagion as it does to undead ur-texts like the collected works of George Romero.