Darren Aronofsky Being Sought For ‘Maleficent’ And ‘Moses’? By Russ Fischer/May 20, 2011 2:20 pm EST What movie will Darren Aronofsky make now that he’s off The Wolverine? We don’t know for certain, but quite a few rumors are flying already. There are projects to which he has been linked over the past years (Intricate, Noah and/or Machine Man) and the recent rumor about Human Nature, which could star George Clooney....
Drew Barrymore Set To Direct ‘The End’ For Warner Bros. By Angie Han/Aug. 2, 2012 9:30 am EST Three years after making her directorial debut with the well-received Whip It, Drew Barrymore is preparing to get behind the camera again. The actress-turned-filmmaker has just finalized a deal to helm The End, a modestly budgeted apocalypse drama for Warner Bros. Common as end-of-the-world flicks are, this one seems to stand apart for its tone....
Exclusive ‘Savages’ Featurette: “On The Set: Cartel Take-Down” By Russ Fischer/June 22, 2012 11:00 am EST In July, Oliver Stone is going back to his lurid daylight noir style (think U-Turn) with his adaptation of Don Winslow’s novel Savages. The film features Taylor Kitsch and Aaron Johnson as a couple of pot growers whose business ends up in the crosshairs of a more powerful Mexican drug lord (Salma Hayek). Her henchman (Benicio Del Toro) kidnaps the guys’ shared girlfriend (Blake Lively), which leads to a pretty intense confrontation....
Gareth Edwards Offers A Brief Update On Project With Timur Bekmambetov By Russ Fischer/Oct. 11, 2010 9:41 pm EST Monsters turned into a serious career move for director Gareth Edwards. It led to him having a deal to write and direct a film that Timur Bekmambetov will produce. We don’t know much about the picture, other than it will be an ““epic human story, set in a futuristic world without humanity....
J.J. Abrams Planning A New Book Project By Angie Han/March 29, 2011 6:00 am EST Abrams’ next big project will be the mysterious Super 8, which he wrote and directed. The film will open in theaters June 10, 2011, and stars Elle Fanning, Amanda Michalka and Kyle Chandler. It’s already got people obsessing over it, picking apart the cryptic trailers for details and whatnot, and critics have been buzzing about the 22 minutes of incomplete footage that were shown last week....
James Franco Could Star In Neil Strauss’ ‘The Game’ By Peter Sciretta/Jan. 6, 2012 2:00 pm EST We may receive a commission on purchases made from links. While Strauss’ book does have information claiming to teach men who to pickup women, the story is a first person account of Rolling Stone writer Struss’ journey into the world of pickup artists, where he not only learned how to become one, but he becomes a master teacher with a group of rotating students in a Sunset Strip mansion....
Jeff Nathanson Doing ‘Men In Black 3D’ Rewrite/Polish; Production Split Into Two Segments By Russ Fischer/Nov. 16, 2010 7:00 pm EST New info on Men in Black 3: the film will start shooting this week in New York, but there’s a wrinkle. The production has hired frequent Steven Spielberg and Brett Ratner collaborator Jeff Nathanson to rewrite/polish one section of the script. (He recently did work on Tower Heist, wrote Rush Hour 2 & 3 and The Terminal, Catch Me If You Can and worked on Indy IV....
Joss Whedon Comments On ‘Buffy The Vampire Slayer’ Reboot By Russ Fischer/Nov. 22, 2010 8:49 pm EST Earlier today we had real confirmation that (once again) a reboot of Buffy the Vampire Slayer is in the works. This time there’s even a screenwriter, Whit Anderson, and a studio, Warner Bros. Predictably, there was a fan outcry against any version of Buffy that does not involve Joss Whedon. Now Joss Whedon has released a statement about the possible film, and while he doesn’t sound crushed — he’s got a little Marvel Studios dream project to work on — he takes refuge in jokes and sarcasm....
Karl Urban’s Practical Joke Results In 10 Seconds Of ‘Star Trek 2’ Set Footage By Germain Lussier/July 15, 2012 9:05 am EST True to his word, Karl Urban has given fans exclusive peak at Star Trek 2 during San Diego Comic-Con. Kind of. Earlier this week, the star of Dredd said he’d post a video called “Star Trek Comic Con Sneak Peak” on YouTube and he did just that. The video features about three minutes of Urban himself surfing to a Cage The Elephant song followed with 10 seconds of Star Trek 2 set footage featuring J....
Larry Charles To Direct Jim Carrey Comedy ‘Pierre Pierre’ By Peter Sciretta/July 20, 2010 6:00 am EST Charles started his career as a writer on the television series Fridays, before moving on to become a producer/writer on Seinfeld. An executive producer on Entourage, Charles produced/directed episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm, before making his transition to feature films with the faux documentaries Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan and Brüno and Bill Maher’s real documentary Religulous....
Last ‘Haywire’ Trailer And Clip Arrive To Tease Gina Carano’s Action Chops By Russ Fischer/Jan. 5, 2012 5:00 pm EST The release of Steven Soderbergh’s Haywire, the action film he and writer Lem Dobbs (Kafka, The Limey) built around MMA star Gina Carano, is almost upon us. The film has played the AFI festival and will open on January 20. To make one final promo push before that opening date, Relativity has released a final, slightly extended trailer for the film, which you can see below....
Legendary’s Latest Acquisition, ‘Spectral,’ Is Like A Gritty ‘Ghostbusters’ By Germain Lussier/Nov. 4, 2011 12:00 pm EST As the script for Ghostbusters 3 gathers dust on Bill Murray’s desk, another writer is taking the idea and running in a whole other direction. Legendary Pictures, the company who is producing The Dark Knight Rises, Man of Steel and Pacific Rim, has just purchased a project by writer Ian Fried called Spectral. The idea of the film is described as a more realistic, gritty and action-packed Ghostbusters as a group of special ops soldiers are specially trained to battle and capture evil ghosts in Manhattan....
Possible Casting: ‘Playboy Club’ Star Naturi Naughton In ‘The Wolverine’, Kevin James In Charlie Kaufman’s ‘Frank Or Francis’ By Angie Han/Aug. 8, 2011 5:00 am EST A couple of bits of interesting but as-yet-unconfirmed casting news have cropped up this weekend. One concerns Naturi Naughton, star of NBC’s upcoming series The Playboy Club, who may be joining forces with Hugh Jackman in The Wolverine; the other, frequent Adam Sandler collaborator Kevin James, who could be working with director Charlie Kaufman in Frank or Francis....
Robert Downey Jr. Comments On ‘Inherent Vice’ With Paul Thomas Anderson By Germain Lussier/Dec. 9, 2011 3:00 pm EST When the news broke that Robert Downey Jr. could be teaming up with Paul Thomas Anderson to make Thomas Pynchon’s Inherent Vice, fans geeked out at the possibility of such an unpredictable pair teaming up for such a cool story. That was back in 2010. In February, things started to heat up but then news on the project went cold....
Rumor: ‘The Wolfman’ Already Heading For A Reboot? By Russ Fischer/June 9, 2011 10:45 am EST The modern incarnations of the Universal’s classic monster stable haven’t quite had the best luck. And by ‘modern’ I mean in the last twenty years: Francis Ford Coppola kicked things off with his not-quite-canonical retelling of Dracula, and Kenneth Branagh bombed with his take on Frankenstein. (Neither of which were Universal films, however.) Fast-forward several years, and Universal did a slightly better job with The Mummy, which at least found an audience, even if it did not quite match the original film....
Summit Developing Frankenstein Story ‘This Dark Endeavor’ By Russ Fischer/Feb. 1, 2011 3:00 pm EST The latest young adult novel to be optioned by a studio seeking Twilight style success is Kenneth Oppel’s This Dark Endeavor. In this case, it is Summit, the Twilight studio, that has actually picked up the option, and sparkly vampire veteran Karen Rosenfelt will produce. The book is about a young Victor Frankenstein who tries to save his gravely ill younger brother Konrad by finding the materials needed to create the Elixir of Life....
The Family’s All Here In A New Image From DreamWorks Animation’s ‘The Croods’ By Germain Lussier/Aug. 30, 2012 3:14 pm EST Next year, you’ll be able to see Nicolas Cage playing a caveman. And by “see” I mean “hear.” He’s the star of The Croods, a brand new 3D animated film from DreamWorks Animation. The film, directed by Chris Sanders and Kirk DeMicco, is about a prehistoric family traversing a wild environment looking for a new cave to call home....
Vacancy Writer Scripting New John Hillcoat Thriller And Remake Of Martyrs By Russ Fischer/May 25, 2010 9:57 pm EST Because John Hillcoat has a strange machinima mini-film coming out to promote the game Red Dead Redemption later this week, I’ve been wondering about his other upcoming projects. And now we’ve got a report that Vacancy and The Hold 3D writer Mark L. Smith is writing The Revenant, which Hillcoat will direct, with Christian Bale currently in talks to star....
What David Fincher Had Planned For ‘Spider-Man’s’ Origin By Germain Lussier/Dec. 20, 2011 6:00 am EST Fans of films that might-have-been, but never-will-be, are likely aware of David Fincher’s history with Spider-Man. (And if you read Superhero Bits Monday, you already know about this update. We’ve simply decided to highlight in detail.) In 1999, Fincher was on a short list to possibly make the film that ended up being Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man (you can read about that here)....
WTF: Footage From Sean Connery’s ‘Sir Billi’ By Russ Fischer/June 24, 2010 9:09 am EST Sir Sean Connery has been absent from movie screens since 2003’s The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Retiring on a high note can be difficult, but LXG is a more ignominious way to end a notable career than anyone would have predicted. So, to ensure that comic book misfire isn’t the end point of his illustrious movie career, Connery is now part of something that looks even worse: an animated adventure called Sir Billi....
