The political thriller is back, baby… or maybe it never really left. These kinds of movies are a bit of a risky proposition nowadays, as they’re often too preachy or too complicated for the average moviegoer, but with the right cast, you can have a hit on your hands. We’ve been seeing Russell Crowe in a lot of these sorts of movies lately, and once again he is the star of State of Play, a movie based on the BBC mini-series of the same name. Also joining him are Ben Affleck, Helen Mirren, Rachel McAdams, Jason Bateman, Robin Wright Penn and Jeff Daniels.

The movie revolves around an investigative reporter who is trying to uncover the truth about the murder of a politician’s mistress. Kevin MacDonald (The Last King of Scotland) is directing from a script that was written by Tony Gilroy (Michael Clayton, The Bourne Ultimatum), Matthew Michael Carnahan (Lions for Lambs, The Kingdom), and Billy Ray (Breach, Flightplan). The trailer didn’t look like anything special, but based on those names alone (particularly that “dream team” trio of writers), I have to assume there’s some substance to the thing. What do you think? State of Play hits theatres on April 17th. Check out the trailer in HD over at Yahoo! now.