Missing Landman this fall? Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered. A trio of oilmen is headed into a deal that could mean fortune or famine in the first trailer for the new indie thriller Williston. Ghosts fan-favorite Matt Walsh trades comedy for drama in the new film, which is slated to make its world festival premiere next month. Before that, Collider is proud to exclusively present the first trailer for Williston.
The film comes from Adam Seidel, who serves as both writer and director on the film. It’s his sophomore effort as writer/director, after the 2026 crime thriller Anywhere, with Sean Gunn. The movie was filmed on location in Oklahoma, and is a production of Buffalo 8. In the trailer, three representatives from an oil company, Larry (Walsh), Tom (Jonathan Lipnicki), and Barb (Geneva Carr), are headed to rural North Dakota to negotiate for the rights to what could be a massive oil bonanza beneath an aquifer. The problem is that the parcel of land in question is owned by Indian Jim, who harbors an intense resentment of the oil industry: every time someone’s attempted to buy the rights in the past, they’ve been sent packing.
Tom’s presence there is something of a mystery; he’s only been with the company for a few weeks, but only veteran employees are sent to negotiate with Jim, whose negotiation demands are very unconventional and non-negotiable. Have they been sent on a fool’s errand, or will they succeed where so many others have failed? You’ll find out when Williston has its world premiere at the Coronado Island Film Festival in Coronado, California, on November 8.
Collider Exclusive · 8 Questions · 2 Minutes Which Coen Brothers Movie Would You Thrive In? Lebowski · O Brother · Fargo · No Country
Nobody writes people like the Coen brothers. The decent ones. The talkers. The ones who stopped trying years ago. And the ones who can already see how bad this is going to get. Four films, four completely different ways of handling trouble. Eight questions decide which one you would actually walk out of.
🎳Lebowski(1998)
🎸O Brother(2000)
❄️Fargo(1996)
🪙No Country(2007)
01
A bag of money lands in your lap. What happens next? Every Coen film starts roughly here. It never goes smoothly.
02
Somebody is being completely unreasonable with you. How does it go? Coen dialogue is mostly people failing to understand each other.
03
What is your actual relationship with work? Everyone in these films is either working far too hard or not at all.
04
Long drive, bad weather, nobody else on the road. How are you? There is always a drive in these films. It is never a good drive.
05
You are offered a shortcut that is not quite legal. This is the moment where the Coens find out who you really are.
06
The plan has fallen apart completely. What is your move? In a Coen film the plan always falls apart. That is the genre.
07
Which of these sounds most like something you would say? Nobody writes a line quite like the Coens. Which one is yours?
08
How does your film end? Eight questions in, this is the one that decides your movie.
The Verdict Is In Your Coen Film Is…
Four films, four completely different ways of handling money, trouble
and other people. This is the one you would survive, why it suits you, and what it would cost you to
be there.
The Big Lebowski · 1998
The Big Lebowski
You have quietly arranged your life so that very little can get
to you, and a surprising number of people find that infuriating. You would be completely at
home here.
The Dude is the only person in the film with no ambition, and the only one who comes out
the other side undamaged. That is not an accident.
You do not chase things. You let situations arrive and you deal with them at your own
pace, which is a genuine skill however lazy it looks.
This is a full crime plot happening around a man who mostly wants his rug back, and that
is exactly the energy you would bring to it.
Everything goes wrong. You abide. The film ends.
O Brother, Where Art Thou? · 2000
O Brother
You talk your way through life and it works far more often than
it should. Give you a bad situation and an audience and you will find a way out of both at
once.
Everett never has a plan that survives contact with reality. He has something better,
which is the ability to keep talking until a new one turns up.
You are the optimist in the group, the one who makes a ridiculous idea sound reasonable
at two in the morning.
This is the warmest film the Coens have made. It is a chase, a comedy and a musical at
once, and nobody in it is quite beyond saving.
You would end up famous entirely by accident, and act like you planned it all along.
Fargo · 1996
Fargo
You would survive Fargo because you are the only kind of person
who does: patient, decent, and completely unimpressed by anybody trying to be clever.
Marge Gunderson solves the whole case by being polite, thorough and unhurried while
everybody around her panics. That is the entire argument of the film.
You do the boring parts of the job, which is precisely why you would notice the thing
everyone else walked straight past.
Fargo is about ordinary greed causing enormous damage, and about one person who simply
refuses to be corrupted by any of it.
You would go home at the end of it, have dinner, and sleep perfectly well.
No Country for Old Men · 2007
No Country
You do not expect the world to be fair and you stopped being
surprised about it a long time ago. That clear-eyed quality is exactly what this film asks
for.
No Country is the Coens at their coldest: a film where being smart, fast and careful
might still not be anywhere near enough.
You plan for the worst, you keep your own counsel, and some part of you is already
working out the exit.
Llewelyn Moss is competent, prepared and resourceful, and the film is honest about
whether any of that is ever sufficient.
You would see it coming. Whether that helps is the one question the film refuses to
answer.
Who Are the Stars of ‘Williston’?
A former correspondent on The Daily Show, Matt Walsh has been a mainstay in the comedy scene for two decades, with appearances in Road Trip, Semi-Pro, and Old School; he was nominated for two Emmys for his role on the HBO comedy Veep. Lipnicki earned fame as a child star in the 1990s with roles in Jerry Maguire, Stuart Little, and Like Mike; he recently had a memorable role in the Robert Pattinson drama Primetime. Geneva Carr starred on the CBS legal drama Bull for six seasons; she is also a Tony nominee for her role in the play Hand to God. The film also features a number of up-and-coming indigenous actors, including Big Dan Warrior (Seven Cemeteries), Zachary Hokeah (Killers of the Flower Moon), Chris Gazaway (King Ivory), and Mike Simpson (Trail of Tears: The Hymn).
Williston will have its world premiere at the Coronado Island Film Festival on November 8. Stay tuned to Collider for future updates.
