Get a First Look at David O. Russell’s Long-Lost Movie 'Accidental Love'

Today, David O. Russell is an Oscar-nominated writer/director on a three film hot streak, Jake Gyllenhaal is winning raves for Nightcrawler, and Jessica Biel is an expectant mom married to Justin Timberlake.

Back in 2008, however, they were just trying to keep the lights on on the set of their ultimately ill-fated satire, Nailed, which is now known as Accidental Love and finally getting a release in February. We’re getting a first look at the trailer above.

The comedy stars Biel as a small town waitress who gets shot in the head with a nail gun while her cop boyfriend (James Marsden) is proposing. Because she doesn’t have health insurance — this, of course, is set in the time before Obamacare — she can’t get the nail removed from her skull, leading to manic behavior and a breakup with the sleazy Marsden.

So she heads to Washington, D.C., to lobby her congressman. The politico, played by Jake Gyllenhaal, turns out to be the perfect romantic match for a woman with a nail lodged in her brain. Sure, the premise might sound like a stretch, but how did a movie with this many A-list names attached land on the shelf for so long?

The main problem was money: The film’s financing was shaky throughout the shoot — producer Lucy Fisher told Collider the movie was interrupted 14 times during production and post-production. Ultimately, the production was shut down for good before Russell was able to finish the most crucial scene: the one in which Biel takes a nail to the head.

Later attempts to reach some kind of deal never panned out and Russell officially quit in 2010. ”This has been a painful process for me,” he told The Hollywood Reporter at the time. “I, unfortunately, am no longer involved in the project and cannot call it ‘my’ film.”

When we last heard, the movie had fallen to a new producer and a cut had been submitted for an MPAA rating. Now, the film will be released on VOD and in limited theaters in February, without Russell’s name attached; the director is credited as Stephen Greene, which seems to be the 21st century version of Alan Smithee.