Meet Shia LaBeouf, investigative reporter, in ‘The Company You Keep’ trailer

LaBeouf in “The Company You Keep.” (Via YouTube) Once upon a time, Robert Redford played a dogged reporter in “All the President’s Men,” a film that tends to come up in conversation a lot here at The Washington Post. Can’t imagine why.

Redford’s new film, “The Company You Keep,” will undoubtedly foster another round of “President’s Men” discussion since — based on the just-released trailer — its political-conspiracy vibe is reminiscent of that 1976 classic of shadowy, parking-garage-meeting intrigue.

But this time it’s not Redford — who produced and directed the film — who plays the determined investigative journalist. It’s Shia LaBeouf, whose character probes into the past of a suspected former member of the Weather Underground (played by Redford) and shifts aggressively into young-Bob-Woodward mode.

The film, scheduled to screen Sept. 9 and 10 at the Toronto International Film Festival, also boasts a cast that includes Anna Kendrick (who, based on the clip, may be LaBeouf’s Deep Throat?), Stanley Tucci, Susan Sarandon, Terrence Howard, Julie Christie, Nick Nolte and Chris Cooper, among many others. Check it out below, then decide whether you can buy LaBeouf as a hard-hitting journalist who (his words) is “doing [the FBI’s] job better than they are.” For what it’s worth, he’s pretty convincing, at least as much as one can gauge from a two-minute clip.