Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s Directorial Debut Sells at Sundance

We already knew that actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt wasn’t just a pretty face. In the last couple of years he’s proved himself to be the best thing to come out of Hollywood since sliced Brando, starring in blockbusters such as Inception, Looper, and The Dark Knight Rises. Now he seems to have impressed with his first feature film as director, Don Jon’s Addiction, which has just been bought by Relativity Media for $4m after screening at the Sundance Film Festival.

Described as a romantic sex-comedy, the film follows the porn-addicted Jon Martello (played by Gordon-Levitt, and a thinly veiled homage to Byron’s Don Juan) as he begins to eschew his love of pornography in favour of attempting to form meaningful relationships with real live women, including Scarlett Johanssen and Julianne Moore.

The film has been generally very well received. Jeremy Kay of the Guardian described it as “…a fun, occasionally flabby romp that should find its audience”, while Germain Lussier of Slashfilm wrote “That Don Jon’s Addiction, with its energetic tone, upbeat pace, and important message, comes from a first time director is incredible. That the director is one of our most popular actors is even more impressive.”

You can’t please all of the people all of the time though, as proved by Todd McCathy’s review over at The Hollywood Reporter; he labeled the film as ‘crude and repetitive’. Still, we doubt that’s causing Gordon-Levitt to lose any sleep, as his sex-filled first feature has quickly sold to Relativity Media for a cool four mill.

Gordon-Levitt has been making his own short films for a few years, and also has a hand in composing, editing, producing, and writing. In short, JGL is one multi-talented guy. We’ll be keeping a close watch on him, and who knows – acting may turn out to be the least of his accomplishments.