Billy Bob Thornton’s tour of irascible assholes given to brusque dismissals of younger guys and kids (see Bad Santa, Bad News Bears, School for Scoundrels) continues with New Line’s Mr. Woodcock, starring he, Seann William Scott and Susan Sarandon. The film, which opens in January, stars Scott as John Farley, a bestselling self-help book author who returns home to find his single mother (Sarandon) dating the titular gym coach who made his pudgy adolescence a living hell.

It’s funny to me off the bat because I knew a douchebag kid with the same last name in middle and high school, but Thornton needs desperately to mix in some more amoral sharks (i.e., The Ice Harvest) and roles in straight dramas to avoid becoming a one-trick pony. I think audiences are already wearying of this routine a bit, or at least just need a break from it. Tonic may arrive next year in the form of the Polish brothers’ The Astronaut Farmer; Thornton is quite enamored with it and told me it will likely wind up being “one of the top three or four films,”  on his personal list, in which he’s starred. To view the Mr. Woodcock trailer from Ifilm.com, click here.