Caffeinated Clint
– Jennifer Carpenter (TVs “Dexter”, “Quarantine”) has joined the cast of the indie thriller “Hungry Rabbit Jumps” starring Nicolas Cage and January Jones. Carpenter, married to her “Dexter” co-star (er, brother) Michael C. Hall in real life, will play the best friend to Jones’ musician character (Variety).
– Krysten Ritter (from TV’s “Breaking Bad”) will join “Narnia” regular Ben Barnes for “Killing Bono”, an indie comedy chronicling the early days of U2 from a rival band’s perspective. Nick Hamm will direct (Variety)
– Summit have picked up the distribution rights to Roman Polanski’s “The Ghost Writer” starring Pierce Brosnan and Ewan McGregor (Variety).
– Tyler Posey (The young actor who “Twilight” author Stephenie Meyer originally envisioned as ‘Jacob’) will play ‘the Michael J.Fox character’ in MTV’s small-screen “Teen Wolf”. The series, said to be less campy and more in the vein of dark teen drama “The Vampire Diaries”, will see Posey play a dorky high-school student who gets a rush of new powers, including the ability to attract girls, after a wolf attack. Tyler Hoechlin, Crystal Reed and Dylan O’Brien have also been cast in the series, which is set to premiere on the box next year. I’ve also heard that Warner Bros are pushing ahead with a relaunch of the “Teen Wolf” film franchise. The studio are undecided whether to remake the original 1985 film or sequelize it (Personally, I say go with a sequel – “Son of Teen Wolf”). (THR).
– DreamWorks Studios has picked up a pitch from screenwriter Andrea McCloud titled “I Saw You.” Based on a comics anthology edited by Julia Wertz, the pitch revolves around four intersecting love stories derived from missed-connections ads. George Tillman Jr. is attached to direct and produce through his State Street Pictures with Robert Teitel (The Hollywood Reporter).
– The unit publicist for Sylvester Stallone’s “The Expendables”, Sheryl Main, answered a few questions for those Schwarzenegger fanatics over at The Arnold Fans about the big guy’s highly-anticipated cameo, and whether or not he’ll be appearing in any behind-the-scenes footage. “Yeah, I have the three of them (for the interview)”, Main says, when asked whether Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis and Stallone were interviewed for the film. “The three of them was standing up where the alter was and I asked them about working together and there’s a nice little interaction between the three of them. It was really fun.” Main also promised some kind of “Expendables” PR event at next year’s Comic-Con.
– “Samson and Delilah” took out Best Film, Best Direction (Warwick Thornton), Best Original Screenplay and a shared AFI Young Actor Award for Rowan McNamara and Marissa Gibson at Saturday evening’s AFI Awards, as well as Industry Awards for Best Cinematography (Warwick Thornton), Best Sound and the AFI Member’s Choice Award.
– L.A film critics have announced “The Hurt Locker” the best film of the year; “Up in the Air” has also scored with the press (IndieWire).
– Disney’s “The Princess and the Frog” garnered $25 million on it’s first weekend of release. It’s a solid solid for the film, the first hand-drawn animated feature from the studio in quite some time, and reinforced John Lasseter’s belief that there’s still a place for 2D animation in today’s market. Disney prexy of domestic distribution Chuck Viane tells Variety, “Ron Clements and John Musker, the directors, and the entire animated team have created a story that leaps off the screen,” Viane said.
– Guillermo del Toro dropped by TheOneRing.net to offer an update on how “The Hobbit” films are progressing.
– The Spierg Brothers’ “Daybreakers”, due for release in Australia 21st January 2010, has been pushed back to 4 February.
– Mel Gibson will direct Leonardo DiCaprio in an untitled Viking movie. William Monahan, who penned DiCaprio’s “The Departed”, is writing the script. Producer Graham King, who wouldn’t divulge story details, tells Variety “This will be an awe-inspiring story, created with some of the industry’s finest cinematic talent and I am just over the moon to be making this film with Mel, Leo and Bill”.
– The History Channel has greenlit Joel ’24’ Surnow’s ”The Kennedys,” an eight-hour miniseries about the legendary family. Former “24” director/EP Jon Cassar is set to direct (The Hollywood Reporter).
– According to Bloody Disgusting former “Greatest American Hero” William Katt and “Saw II” star Emmanuelle Vaugier are among the support cast of Fox’s Nick Stahl-headlined sequel to “Mirrors”.
– Filmmaker Zhang Yimou (“Curse of the Golden Flower”, “Hero”) hopes to coax either Tom Hanks, Tom Cruise or Brad Pitt into doing his next film, “Thirteen Girls of Jinling”, based on the novel by Yan Geling. The film would tell the story of a group of “foreign” priests who hide a group of prostitutes (as well as school girls and Chinese soldiers) in their Church when Japanese troops broke into the city of Nanking in 1937 (Monkey Peaches).
– The other day we mentioned that Kevin Smith has had to rename his upcoming Bruce Willis/Tracey Morgan cop-comedy “A Couple of Dicks” to…. well, he didn’t say. The Warner Bros’ Exhibitors Site notes that the trailer for an upcoming film titled “Cop Out” will be playing with prints of “Sherlock Holmes”. Just checked in with a friend at the studio who confirmed that “Cop Out” is indeed the new title of Smith’s film… so there you have it! Whatcha think!? Still interested in seeing something that doesn’t have “Dicks” in the title!?
– Former “Gilmore Girls” star Scott Patterson will be guest-starring on “90210” (The Ausiello Files).
– J.J Abrams may be directing another “tentpole” pic for Paramount before he begins work on “Star Trek 2” and “Mission : Impossible 4” (The New York Times).
– Filmmaker Todd Phillips told The Las Vegas Sun that he is “halfway through the script,†for “The Hangover 2”, and that he doesn’t “want to give away too much right now, but we’ll film this coming summer for release for summer 2011.â€
– Actor Jamison ‘Alan Frog’ Newlander talks about “Lost Boys 3 : The Thirst” in this YouTube video.
