It’s definitely been a rollercoaster ride for Shia LaBeouf and his fans over the past month. Fans thought Christmas had come a week early last December when a wonderful short film hit the internet that had been ‘created’ by LaBoeuf in an attempt to try his hand at directing. HOWARDCANTOUR.COM was a delightful 15 minute watch that proved Labeouf was not only talented in front of the camera but also behind it. Shortly afterwards it was revealed that the entirety of the material seen in HOWARDCANTOUR.COM had been plagiarized from a writer and cartoonist named Daniel Clowes. This was a devastating blow for fans of Labeouf after his short film gave them hope that the excellent actor may have an incredibly promising directorial career on the horizon. However the controversy didn’t stop there when the TRANSFORMERS star began tweeting a string of strange apologies to Clowes that happened to also be plagiarized from other people. The debacle seemingly came to end when LaBeouf received a cease and desist letter from Clowes’ solicitor and the actor apologized bizarrely through skywriting.
Now the actor has taken to Twitter once again to announce his apparent retirement, you can see what the actor wrote below:
In light of the recent attacks against my artistic integrity, I am retiring from all public life.
— Shia LaBeouf (@thecampaignbook) January 10, 2014
The tweet was shortly followed up another message which sported the hashtag ‘#Stopcreating‘, you can see his followup tweet below:
My love goes out to those who have supported me.
— Shia LaBeouf (@thecampaignbook) January 10, 2014
Whether or not this means Shia Labeouf is retiring from acting all together or just social media and publicity is unknown at this point. It would be a huge shame if the actor were to end his Hollywood career here though, as I am actually a big fan of LaBeouf’s work despite the fact that I disagree with some of his recent ‘creative’ decisions. The troubled star began his career with the large shadow of Disney looming over him after starring in the television series EVEN STEVENS and the charming HOLES film adaptation. Soon after that LaBeouf scored minor supporting roles alongside the likes of Will Smith and Keanu Reeves in I, ROBOT and CONSTANTINE.
It wasn’t until 2007 when the former Disney child star would really hit the big time with DISTURBIA and perhaps more importantly Michael Bay’s TRANSFORMERS. Both films were very different from eachother and both films were also incredibly successful in different ways, however there’s no denying that LaBeouf’s charm, wit and on-screen presence carried both pictures excellently. It was most certainly clear from that point onwards that LaBeouf would definitely be a household name for a very long time.
One bland science-fiction thriller, one terrible INDIANA JONES film and two TRANSFORMERS sequels later however, we come to a very different Shia LaBeouf. The actor decided after the final film in Michael Bay’s TRANSFORMERS trilogy that he was going to take his career in a different direction, and leave the world of Blockbusters behind in favour of more character-driven, independent projects. While this came as good news to those that believed the actors true talent laid beyond the world of robots, explosions and coming of age drama, this was bittersweet to those of us that fell in love with the Shia LaBeouf of old.
Since then LaBeouf has kept his word and chosen very different productions to star in such as LAWLESS, CHARLIE COUNTRYMAN and the upcoming NYMPHOMANIAC. Although the actor is undeniably talented the results of his recent work have been incredibly mixed with the obvious standout of course being John Hillcoat’s fantastic LAWLESS. He has two upcoming projects currently in production for release later this year, one of which is Lars Von Trier’s controversial two part drama NYMPHOMANIAC and the other is a World War II drama starring Brad Pitt called FURY. Only time will tell if these are the last additions to the great actors filmography, we can only hope that this is either some kind of misplaced joke or an elaborate piece of promotion for one of the aforementioned projects.
Source: Twitter
