Ricky Gervais has clawed Rob Lowe from the depths of the straight-to-dvd and small screen abyss, casting the talented and under-rated actor in the comedy THIS SIDE OF THE TRUTH, a movie Gervais has co-written and will now direct alongside Matt Robinson.

And Thank God because after starring in STIR OF ECHOES II: THE HOMECOMING and a regular role on Brothers & Sisters it looked like Lowe was never going to get a significant role on the big screen ever again.

Here’s the newly updated plot from Variety, which changes quite a few fundamentals from what we originally heard this movie was about…

The comedy takes place in a world where everybody tells the truth. Gervais plays a storyteller whose job is to ramble on about the 1300s. Faced with losing his job because his terrain is a boring period in history once he gets beyond the Black Death, he invents lying as a way to save himself. Lowe will play his arch nemesis.

Now previously the film was described as taking place in a contemporary setting where no-one lies, until Gervais’ character invented it for his own gain, in particular to win the attention of a beautiful woman. Said women to be played by the delicious Jennifer Garner who was cast back in November.

Have the duo of Gervais and Matt Robinson come to the realisation that a world where no-one lies was a bit of stretch or have the trades just decided to leave that part of the story out?

Ah who cares, it’s Gervais who can do no wrong with his own material (he bores me in others… like his cameo’s in STARDUST & NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM) alongside Garner and Lowe who are pretty fine actors. This, alongside Gervais leading role in David Koepp’s GHOST TOWN is going to make for a fascinating viewing for a guy who always claimed he never wanted to be a film-star.