Bryan Cranston, Steve Carell and Laurence Fishburne go on a somber and silly road trip in first ‘Last Flag Flying’ trailer

Richard Linklater’s last three films — Before Midnight, Boyhood, and Everybody Wants Some!! — have been critical hits, so expectations are exceedingly high for his latest, Last Flag Flying, which is set to have its world premiere when it opens this year’s New York Film Festival on Sept. 28. With Linklater at the helm, and with stars Bryan Cranston, Steve Carell, and Laurence Fishburne headlining, it should be one of the fall’s serious awards contenders — and making the project even more interesting, it’s also the long-delayed sequel to Hal Ashby’s 1973 Jack Nicholson drama The Last Detail, based on the book by Darryl Ponicsan. And now, the film’s first trailer has debuted.

Ashby’s profanity-laced film focused on two sailors (Nicholson and Otis Young) showing a young comrade (Randy Quaid) a good time while escorting him to a naval prison thanks to a petty crime he’d committed. Linklater’s forthcoming follow-up will see those three characters reunite in older age — Cranston playing Nicholson’s character, Fishburne playing Otis Young’s, and Carell playing Quaid’s — as they embark on a road trip instigated by their need to bury Carell’s son, who was killed during the Iraqi invasion. As the above clip makes clear, it’s a journey that looks to be as somber as it is funny, with a boisterous Cranston leading the drinking-and-troublemaking charge.

Moviegoers are apt to hear plenty more about Last Flag Flying as the award season begins ramping up. Following its NYFF bow, the film arrives in theaters on Nov. 3.