Brad Pitt and Natalie Portman are doing a rom-com together. If only we had a modern day Godard!

By Matt Holmes /

Brad Pitt and Julia Roberts... yeah I could see that. They made a good couple in THE MEXICAN. Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie... we all knew that would work in MR. AND MRS. SMITH, and none of us were the least bit surprised when they became a couple soon afterwards. But Brad Pitt and Natalie Portman, in a romantic comedy? There's one high profile Hollywood pairing I never would have put together. Variety have the scoop that Paramount Pictures have acquired the rights to the new Leanne Shapton book with the extraordinary long title, "Important Artifacts and Personal Property from the Collection of Lenore Doolan and Harold Morris, Including Books, Street Fashion, and Jewelry." Paramount won a big bidding war on Tuesday night for the novel. Natalie Portman and her production company Handsomecharlie Films caught wind of the book, she sent it to Brad Pitt who went crazy for it and he brought his Plan B production company on board. Both Portman and Pitt loved the book so much, they are starring in the two lead roles....

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The book takes the form of Sotheby's-like estate auction catalog, with 325 entries and photographs depicting items that reveal the private moments and the rise and fall of a four-year relationship between the fictitious couple Hal Morris (a 40ish photographer) and Lenore Doolan, (a New York Times food columnist in her late 20s). Shapton, an illustrator and art director of the NYT's Op-Ed page, uses items that range from clothes to notes, e-mails and heirlooms to convey the excitement, the hopes and dreams, and ultimately the heartache of a love affair that runs its course.
Portman and Pitt, hell if it were Jean-Luc Godard and this were 1964, I would be delighted by this. Have we got a Godard of today who could make this pairing work? Maybe a Sofia Coppola?