Jennifer Lawrence [Winter's Bone] was a relatively unknown actress about this time last year, now on the back of her performance in Winter's Bone she is an Oscar-nominated hot commodity. Deadline broke the news that Lawrence has been cast in Oliver Stone's Savages. The film is based on the Don Winslow novel of the same name with Shane Salerno penning the adaption.
The story centers on pot growers and best friends, "Ben" and "Chon", who share the same girlfriend, a sexy Laguna Beach girl called "O" [Lawrence]. Chon is an ex-Navy Seal who has just returned from Afghanistan with a substantial amount of high-quality weed. Ben is a botanist who grows the pot from their Laguna Beach home. When a Mexican drug cartel tries to muscle into their business, O is kidnapped and the pair hatch a complex plot to get her back. Stone is meeting with actors like Leonardo DiCaprio, Aaron Johnson, Tom Hardy, James Franco, and Garrett Hedlund to fill out the other two spokes of this love triangle. The director is also reaching out to Benicio Del Toro to play the Mexican cartel muscle. Production will start on Savages this June and will hit theaters in 2012.
