Elston Gunn has sent AICN's Father Geek here his latest report on all the past week's news out in our beloved Hollywoodland, sooooooo dive in and surf thru the wonderful week that was in our...

WEEKLY RECAP...

TAKEN FROM VARIETY AND HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

CASTING

* Jennifer Coolidge (LEGALLY BLONDE, BEST-IN-SHOW) will join Jim Carrey,
Meryl Streep and Jude Law in LEMONY SNICKET for director Brad Silberling and
Paramount/DreamWorks. Liam Aiken and Emily Browning round out the cast as
two of the three orphans.

* Ivana Milicevic has been cast alongside Sean Astin and Vinnie Jones in the
sci-fi indie SLIPSTREAM for MPCA and director David van Eyssen. It's about a
young scientist who invents a time-travel device that allows those who touch
it to travel 10 minutes into the past. His plan to use the machine for a
bank heist goes awry when a group of robbers tries to hold up the same
place.

* Dondre T. Whitfield joins Vivica A. Fox in BEAUTY SHOP for writer/director
Mark Brown.

* Anne Bancroft and Paz Vega (SEX AND LUCIA) have been cast in SPANGLISH,
starring Adam Sandler and Tea Leoni, for Columbia Pictures and
writer/director/producer James L. Brooks.

* Cedric the Entertainer is in talks to star in the action comedy TRACES for
New Line Cinema and Rat Entertainment. The project, based on a Robert
Adetuyi script, centers on a software custodian who wakes up after a car
accident and suffers from memory loss. What's locked inside his head could
actually save his life as he races to identify himself and the people who
are after him.

* Topher Grace is in negotiations to play Dennis Quaid's boss in SYNERGY for
writer/director Paul Weitz and producer Chris Weitz. The pic is about a
veteran magazine ad man who, after a corporate merger, finds himself with a
twentysomething business school grad boss. After a rocky start, the two form
a friendship that is upset after the young boss has an affair with his new
employee's daughter.

* Tyrese and Miranda Otto join Dennis Quaid, Giovanni Ribisi, Miranda Otto
and Jared Padalecki in THE FLIGHT OF THE PHOENIX, 20th Century Fox's remake
that John Moore is directing.

* Lindsay Lohan (FREAKY FRIDAY) is in talks to star in DRAMARAMA for Warner
Bros./Mad Chance Prods. Lohan would play a promising drama student who
attends an elite high school. When her father loses his job and the family
can't afford the private school, she is forced to attend a run-down public
school. There, she forms a drama group with a gang of misfits and ends up
facing her former school in a drama competition called Dramarama.

* Orlando Bloom will star in Ridley Scott's period epic KINGDOM OF HEAVEN
for 20th Century Fox. In the story set in 12th century Europe and the exotic
Far East, Bloom will star as a young peasant who becomes a knight, saves a
kingdom and falls in love with a princess. William Monahan wrote the script
which is being produced by Scott Free Prods.

* Michael Moore will take a rare acting role as a political journalist in
HBO Films' THE FEVER, starring Vanessa Redgrave and Joely Richardson, for
director Carlo Nero. Adapted by Wallace Shawn from his play, the story
chronicles the political awakening of a middle-class woman previously
untouched by world events.

* Gary Oldman and Robert Carlyle star in the black comedy DEAD FISH for
Charley Stadler and Frachise Pictures. It's described as a story of mistaken
identity and unrequited romance, starring Oldman as a hit man and Robert
Carlyle as a debt collector. Cast also includes Terence Stamp, Billy Zane,
Elena Ayana, Andrew Lee Potts and Jimi Mistry.

* Julian Morris (YOUNG ARTHUR) will star in the Focus Features thriller
LIVING THE LIE for writer/director Jeff Wadlow and producer Doug Liman. The
story centers on a prep school refugee attending his last-strike school. He
sends out an email hoax about a serial killer terrorizing the area. When
students begin to disappear, he must discover if his lie has come true.

* Traylor Howard ("Two Guys and a Girl") will star opposite Jamie Kennedy in
the New Line Cinema comedy SON OF THE MASK.

* Eriq La Salle will play a doctor who uses his skills for dubious purposes
in the drama INSIDE OUT for writer/director David Ogden. Steven Weber, Nia
Peeples and Russell Wong also star. It centers on the doctor's move to a
close-knit neighborhood that becomes tragically disrupted as he makes his
rounds. It becomes clear that the doc is manipulating the townsfolk for his
own scientific experiment, leading to betrayal, scandal and murder.

* Ben Affleck has committed to star in GLORY ROAD for producer Jerry
Bruckheimer and Disney about college hoops coach, Don Haskins, who shattered
the color barrier by leading the first all-black lineup of players to the
NCAA championship. Chris Cleveland wrote the script.

* Antonio Banderas and Catherine Zeta-Jones are planning to reprise their
roles in a sequel to THE MASK OF ZORRO for director Martin Campbell. Anthony
Hopkins also is considered likely for an encore.

DIRECTOR/WRITER ATTACHMENTS

* Mel Stewart will write THE PHANTOM, based on the well-known comic, for
Crusader Entertainment and Hyde Park.

* Craig Fernandez will write SENSIBILIDAD, a modern adaptation of Jane
Austen's SENSE AND SENSIBILITY, for Camelot Pictures. The project focuses on
a modern Mexican family in Los Angeles. Fernandez will direct from his
script.

* Stratus Film Co. and producer Paula Paizes will produce MY ABSOLUTELY
UNFORGIVABLE DARK AND EVIL WAYS, penned by Morgan Upton and to be directed
by Stephan Elliott. It centers on man trying to make money for his family of
seven kids only to get in too deep with a baby-obsessed criminal who forces
him to make a choice: die or give up one of his offspring.

* Writer/director Leon Ichaso (PINER) will make MONK, a biopic on
iconoclastic jazz musician and composer Thelonious Sphere Monk, for
GreeneStreet Films. Born in North Carolina in 1917 and raised in New York
City, Monk had won the Apollo Theater's weekly amateur contest so many times
by age 13 that he was prohibited from entering. He was a vital part of the
post-war creativity surge in Harlem and a key figure in the invention of the
bebop style that revolutionized jazz. Monk collaborated with such music
greats as John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, Sonny Rollins and
Charlie Rouse.

* Indian director Sunil Agnihotri is prepping MURDER OF A MISSIONARY, a
movie on the life of Australian missionary Graham Staines, who was murdered
along with his two young sons by a Hindu zealot in 1999.

* Wayne Kramer (THE COOLER) is in talks to direct the contemporary L.A.
detective story THE SLEEPING DETECTIVE for Paramount Pictures and producer
Leonard Goldberg.

* Zhang Yimou is directing HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS about a soldier named
Jin, who disguises himself as a protector of a revolutionary, Mei. During
their travels, the two engage in heroic battles and fall in love.

* Writer/director Pablo Trapero (MUNDO, EL BONARENSE) is helming FAMILIA
RODANTE (ROLLING FAMILY) about an 85-year-old grandmother who hits the road
in a motor home with her extended family to attend a wedding in her small
hometown.
Graciana Chironi stars alongside Liliana Capurro.

* Alejandro Agresti is directing A LESS BAD WORLD from his own script about
a woman who meets her husband, who vanished years earlier. Carlos Roffe
stars with Monica Galan. Pic is set for release in March.

* Ann Hu is directing Emerging Pictures' FEI about two sisters in 1948, Fei
and Ying, whose father was a fireworks maker and who share a love for a
charismatic ex-wrestler named Huang.

* Writer/director Agustin Diaz Yanes (NOBODY WILL TALK ABOUT US WHEN WE'RE
DEAD) is making ALATRISTE, based on the best-selling historical novels of
Spanish writer Arturo Perez-Revert, for Telecino. Project centers on the
adventures of a rougish veteran mercenary of the 16th century wars in
Flanders.

* Spike Jonze will direct WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE , based on the classic
Maurice Sendak children's book for Universal Pictures and Playtone's Tom
Hanks and Gary Goetzman. Pic was originally developed as a CGI film, but the
studio and producers sparked to Jonze's live-action vision.

* MGM and producer Dylan Sellers picked up Vince McKewin's script THE POOL
GUY about a television writer who finds that his advancing age is killing
his career. He comes up with the idea to use his youthful but dim pool boy
as the front for his scripts. But the plan ultimately backfires, both in the
writer's love life and scripting career, as the writer pays the price for
having a handsome alter ego.

* Simon Beaufoy (THE FULL MONTY) will write IN THE PINK, which Tim Allen is
set to topline for Revolution Studios. Based on a pitch by former "SNL"
producer Ryan Shiraki, laffer revolves around a man who teams with a group
of women to sell cosmetics door-to-door after he loses his cushy corporate
job.

* Ron Underwood will direct psychological thriller GRAVITY for Remstar
Prods. Written by Bill Kelly, the project follows the collective stress and
claustrophobia of an airplane's passengers, which sets off an unruly
traveler and threatens to bring down the flight.

* Vishal Bhardwaj will direct the Bollywood pic MANTRA, produced by Shekar
Kapur (FOUR FEATHERS), about a child who acquires magic powers and who has
to deal with the problems that come with them.

* Andrew Fleming is set to direct the comedy FAITH BUFFALO, written by Marc
Lawrence, for Warner Bros./Castle Rock. It's about a New York City party
planner whose life is put in danger when she witnesses a crime. She is then
temporarily relocated to a small town in Montana, where she has trouble
adjusting to local culture but ultimately finds herself attracted to the
sheriff.

* Alexander Witt (RESIDENT EVIL 2) is near a deal to direct the action
thriller COLD SHELTER for Wolfgang Petersen's Radiant Prods. Wes Clark wrote
the script about an American special forces operative who is sent to 1983
Cold War East Germany to infiltrate a terrorist ring. Once there, he begins
to question the values he has always fought to uphold.

* Keith Gordon (THE SINGING DETECTIVE) will script Isaac Asimov's sci-fi
romancer THE END OF ETERNITY for Paramount and Cruise/Wagner. Story centers
on a low-ranking technician who discovers that the woman with whom he has
fallen in love is going to be eliminated in a soon-to-occur time change
promulgated by a group of men dubbed the Eternals.

* James Foley (CONFIDENCE) has signed on to direct a biopic about Montgomery
Clift. Michael Easton wrote the screenplay which follows Clift's life
through his Hollywood career to his death in 1966, a journey that included
addiction, struggles with sexual identity and a car crash that robbed him of
his leading-man looks. Newman/Tooley Films will produce the pic.

* Jennifer Flackett and Mark Levin (MADELINE, WIMBLEDON) will write and
direct FLOWERGIRL for Regency Enterprises. Romantic comedy is described as
ANNIE HALL, but with 11-year-olds.

* Matthew Berry and Eric Abrams will write JOHNNY BRAVO, Warner Bros.'
live-action feature adaptation of the Cartoon Network series, with Dwayne
"The Rock" Johnson attached to star.

* Director Todd Field (IN THE BEDROOM) is developing BACK ROADS, based on
the bestselling novel by Tawni O'Dell, for DreamWorks Pictures, Standard
Film Co. and Darkwoods Prods. Paul Todisco and Ethan Gross (upcoming
REVOLVER) will adapt the story set in western Pennsylvania's mining country.
It follows a teenager whose mother is in jail for killing his abusive father
and who's left to care for his three younger sisters. Meanwhile, he has
taken an interest in a sexy, melancholic mother of two down the road.

MISCELLANEOUS PRODUCTION TIDBITS

* MGM has nixed the planned JINX spin-off movie featuring Halle Berry's
character from DIE ANOTHER DAY.

* Myriad Pictures will co-produce and co-finance the Mission Pictures
project PICCADILLY JIM, a P.G. Wodehouse comedy to be directed by John McKay
from a Julian Fellowes script. Pic, which starts shooting in November, will
star Sam Rockwell, Tom Wilkinson and Amanda Peet.

* Columbia Pictures has acquired the rights to two projects to be produced
by Sid Ganis' Out of the Blue. The first is an untitled comedy set in the
world of college basketball from the writing duo David T. Wagner and Brent
Goldberg (NATIONAL LAMPOON'S VAN WILDER). The second, temporarily called THE
JUICE PROJECT, is a comedy by novelist/screenwriter Michael Golding. It's
about a guy whose mother has to finally give him up to his wife and their
new child. The mother then informs her son that his father, whom he thought
was dead, is alive, and running a chain of juice bars in Encino.

* Subhash Ghai's production company Mukta Arts is producing Abbas-Mastan's
thriller AITRAAZ, starring Kareena Kapoor, ex-Miss World Priyanka Chopra and
Akshay Kumar. Ghai will direct KISNA, a musical love story set in the 1930s,
starring Vivek Oberoi and Esha Sherwani.

* Universal Pictures has optioned DC Comics' THE PSYCHO, with Circle of
Confusion attached to produce. Written by James Hudnall and drawn by Dan
Brereton, the comic tells the story of a man forced to become what he hates
most, a superhuman agent who serves the government, in order to prove
himself innocent of a crime he didn't commit.

* Universal Pictures and Michael Mann's Forward Pass has optioned Peter
Landesman's New York Times Magazine Aug. 17 feature "Arms and the Man" about
shadowy arms dealer Victor Bout. Landesman will write the screenplay and
Mann is attached to direct the film.

* Disney's THE ALAMO will not open Dec. 25 as had been planned. Instead, the
Touchstone Pictures production will be released in April. The move came at
the request of the filmmakers, who needed more time to complete the film.

* Dimension Films acquired the life rights of George Lutz, who lived in the
famed Amityville haunt and experienced the paranormal happenings attributed
to the murder of an entire family that previously lived in the house.
Dimension bought the rights from Nu Image and got a completed first script
draft that revisits the house 25 years after the Lutz family fled. The
studio is already talking with a well established horror director who'll
shoot a film to be released by early next summer.

GUNN SHOTS

(NOT from the trades)

* JOIN ME by Danny Wallace is a true story about a guy in the UK that starts
a massive world wide cult ... by accident. Wallace announced on his website
http://www.join-me.co.uk that the movie rights have been picked up. Richard
Curtis and his wife Emma Freud are both "Joinees" and it has been hinted
that Working Title films will have heavy involvement in the project. For
more information see http://www.join-me.co.uk and http://www.joinmeusa.com/

* SPOOK, a Canadian independent film which tells the chilling story of
Canada's secret involvement in the Vietnam war, and the forty-thousand
Canadians who served there will be screened on Sunday, November 9 at 2:00 pm
at The Village East Cinema, Screen #7 at the prestigious New York
International Independent Film & Video Festival. Pic was stars Barry Levy
("X-Files," "Stargate SG-1"), who also wrote and directed, Rachel Cronin
("Ed") and Peter Lacroix ("Stargate SG 1"). Visit
http://www.spookthemovie.com for more.

* The "Rock and Roll" film festival is coming to NYC! On Wednesday, November
12th 2003, the first in a monthly series will begin in New York City at 9:00
pm at the Pioneer Theater (155 East 3rd Street -at Ave. A- New York, NY
10009). Also, the 2004 touring edition of Backseat Film Festival (BFF) will
kick off in Philadelphia! The festival, fast becoming known as one of
America's most fun and edgy film festivals, will consist of three days of
stimulating screenings and debaucherous parties from January 23-25th 2004 at
the Triangle Theater (1220 N. Lawrence Street, Philadelphia, PA 19122). More
info can be found at http://www.backseatfilmfestival.com.

* The fire-rampaged San Diego-based independent film TRADE OFFS will be
screening at the Indo-American Arts Council Festival, at the Anthology Film
Archives located at 32 Second Avenue, on Saturday, November 8, 2003 at 9pm.
TRADE OFFS is the creation of first time writer/director and San Diego
resident Vikram Yashpal. Log on to http:// www.TradeOffs-themovie.com for
more.

* Watch the dramatic conclusion of DEADEND.Com at http://www.deadend.com

Until next week.

Elston Gunn

elstongunn@hotmail.com