Like Prince and Loni Anderson before him, Hollywood It-boy Josh Hartnett is proving to the rest of the free world that Minnesota can pull its weight on the breakout-sex-symbol production line. As we see in Black Hawk Down and the underappreciated Virgin Suicides, it doesn’t hurt that Josh can actually act. Oddly, his real debut as a big-time romantic lead (we don’t count Pearl Harbor) casts him as a recently dumped dude who swears off sex for Lent. As if the hormonal ramifications of his sudden celibacy weren’t grave enough, he’s got a new drop-dead gorgeous love interest in the picture to crank up the temptation quotient—A Knight’s Tale’s Shannyn Sossamon. With an R rating attributed to “strong sexual content, nudity and language,” it’s unlikely that 40 Days is a glorified instructional video for born-again virgins, if you know what we mean. Knowing Miramax, we think they’ll not only find a way to bring Hartnett’s character back into the carnally knowledgeable world, but they’ll do it with panache. Teen-movie slump be damned, we haven’t been this excited about a local boy making good since Apollonia’s skinny-dip in what she thought was Lake Minnetonka.
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