Hey there, ol'Father Geek here at AICN's Central Texas Compound, aka GEEK HEADQUARTERS, after a riotious premiere screening of "SAHARA" and it's hours-long rooftop afterparty here in Austin. Our fantastic PARAMOUNT Theatre (1915) hosted the sold out (1400 seats) screening of the motion picture adapted from Clive Cussler's great Dirk Pitt adventure novel series, and the film tore the roof off the place. SAHARA (not to be confused with Brooke Shields' 1983 dud of a racing flick, or Bogart's classic brooding WW2 desert war movie from 43) is immense FUN in the breakneck devil-may-care spirit of a present day "Raiders", or "King Solomon's Mines". Matthew McConaughey's charming and physical Dirk is letter perfect, Steve Zahn outstanding, and Director Breck Eisner (Thoughtcrimes, Taken) takes us thru the beautifully shot North African desert from one phantastical adventure to another at lightening speed. One more note, the entire film is propelled by a fun-tastic original score by the under-used composer Clint Mansell (Pi, Suspect Zero, Man on Fire). Any way it was a great evening for everyone in attendence from teenagers to 80+ year olds, and we all stayed up way too late/early powered by the film's and its makers' contagious electric energy. Now here's Elston and all the confirmed cine news from last week...
THE WEEKLY RECAP...
TAKEN FROM VARIETY AND HOLLYWOOD REPORTER
CASTING
* Shohreh Aghdashloo, Dylan Walsh ("nip/tuck") and Ebon Moss-Bachrach have
joined the cast of IL MARE for Warner Bros. Pictures and Village Roadshow.
They join Keanu Reeves, Sandra Bullock and Christopher Plummer in the
picture, which is based on the 2000 Korean romance/sci-fi feature, SIWORAE.
Aghdashloo is set to play Bullock's medical colleague and confidante. Walsh
will star as Bullock's former fiance, Morgan. Moss-Bachrach will play
Reeves' younger brother.
* Hugh Jackman, Jason Isaacs and Romola Garia will to star in GOOD, an
independent film adaptation of the C.P. Taylor stage play, for Tailor-Made
Films, Axiom Films and Celluloid Dreams. Jackman will play a professor who
has been seduced by Germany's national pride and renaissance during the
early 1930s as well as a flirtation with a student, played by Garai. Isaacs
plays his Jewish friend. John Wrathall wrote the script and Lone Scherfig
(ITALIAN FOR BEGINNERS) will direct. Pic will be produced by Miriam Segal
and John Palermo; latter is Jackman's producing partner.
* Ryan Merriman and Mary Elizabeth Winstead (THE RING TWO) will star in
CHEATING DEATH: FINAL DESTINATION 3. Warren Zide, Craig Perry, Glen Morgan
and James Wong are producing. Wong, who directed the first installment, will
direct the latest installment. The story is set six years after the events
of the first movie and centers on a high school senior who has a premonition
of a fatal amusement-park accident involving her and her friends. When the
premonition becomes a reality, those who survive are forced to deal with the
repercussions of "cheating death." Winstead plays the senior with the
premonition, and Merriman plays a classmate who becomes her unlikely ally in
the race to save their own lives. Morgan and Wong wrote the script.
* Cynthia Nixon will star in Alex Steyermark's indie feature ONE LAST THING.
Pic is being produced through the HDNet Films division of 2929
Entertainment, and will shoot in April. Co-starring Michael Angarano, film
follows a mom and her terminally ill son whose dying wish is made on
national TV when a show offers to fulfill his wildest dreams. Barry
Stringfellow penned the screenplay.
* Thomas Haden Church (SIDEWAYS) has been cast as Spidey's new archenemy in
SPIDER-MAN 3 for director Sam Raimi. Production is scheduled to begin early
next year.
* Jason Bateman and Amy Poehler will star in THE HEARTBREAK KID for director
James Bobin and DreamWorks Pictures. The story centers on a man who is
convinced that he has finally met the right girl and marries too quickly.
While on his honeymoon and in the process of discovering that his new bride
(Poehler) is a nightmare, he meets the girl of his dreams. Scott Armstrong
and Leslie Dixon are writing the screenplay for producers Radar Pictures and
Davis Entertainment. It's loosely inspired by the 1972 Neil Simon-scripted
comedy that was directed by Elaine May.
* Cheryl Hines ("Curb Your Enthusiasm") is set to star with Robin Williams
in the Barry Sonnenfeld-directed comedy RV for Columbia Pictures and Red
Wagon. Hines will play the spouse of an overworked man who abruptly loads
his family into an RV en route to Colorado, hoping they won't discover he is
actually going there to attend a business meeting. George Rodkey penned the
script; Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel did the rewrite.
* Viola Davis is set to star opposite 50 Cent in Jim Sheridan's untitled pic
formerly dubbed LOCKED AND LOADED for Paramount/MTV. Davis will play the
grandmother who raised 50 Cent; rapper portrays a gangster turned musician.
Joy Bryant also stars. Terrence Winter scripted.
* Vera Farmiga (DOWN TO THE BONE) will play the female lead opposite Matt
Damon, Leonardo DiCaprio and Jack Nicholson in Martin Scorsese's THE
DEPARTED for Warner Bros. At the same time, she has closed a deal for a
supporting role in Anthony Minghella's BREAKING AND ENTERING, starring Jude
Law.
* Joan Chen ("Twin Peaks") will play a Shanghai nightclub singer who
struggles to survive in Australia with her two kids in Fortissimo Film
Sales/Film Finance Corp.'s THE HOME SONG STORIES for writer/director Tony
Ayres (WALKING ON WATER), based on his childhood.
* Tatum O'Neal will star opposite Vanessa L. Williams and Nashawn Kearse in
Liberty Artists' MY BROTHER, an inner-city family drama, for director
Anthony Lover.
* Lil' JJ has been tapped for a role in MGM/Paramount's remake of YOURS,
MINE AND OURS, starring Dennis Quaid and Rene Russo. Fourteen-year-old
actor/comedian will play one of 18 children in a blended family. Raja
Gosnell directs.
DIRECTOR/WRITER ATTACHMENTS
* Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg (HAROLD AND KUMAR GO TO WHITE CASTLE)
will write JOHNNY BLAZE for DreamWorks/Imagine as a star vehicle for Eddie
Murphy. It's an action comedy about an old-school rapper who retires and
becomes a private eye who solves crimes within the hip-hop world.
* John Leonetti will direct a sequel to THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT from a script
being written by Michael Weiss for FilmEngine and Benderspink. Story will
follow a new character who, like Kutcher in the first, finds he can travel
through time. As he changes past events, though, they have unexpected
consequences in the present.
* Sony Pictures is in talks with Marvel Entertainment to turn KILLRAVEN,
into a sci-fi tentpole pic, with Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Robert
Schenkkan in talks to adapt the 1970s comicbook series. Set in a future
where mankind has been enslaved by an alien race, storyline follows a man
who, though born in captivity, rises through gladiatorial battles to become
the leader of a group of revolutionaries. Called the Freemen, his
warrior-slaves unite in an attempt to drive the invaders off the Earth.
* Jim Herzfeld (MEET THE FOCKERS) has been tapped by Disney to do a rewrite
on TOY STORY 3, which Bradly Raymond (LION KING 1 1/2) is in talks to
direct.
* Writer Ronald Harwood and producer Mark Milln (both of BEING JULIA) are
reuniting for a biopic of another stage diva, legendary ballerina Margot
Fonteyn, for Hogarth Pictures. The Fonteyn movie is based on the bio by
Meredith Daneman. It delves into Fonteyn's turbulent marriage to a
Panamanian hoodlum, which saw her arrested for his part in a coup plot, and
explores her extraordinary late-flowering onstage partnership with Rudolf
Nureyev, which lasted until she was 60.
* Larry Kasanoff will direct the 3-D toon FOODFIGHT! for Lions Gate Family
Entertainment and his Threshold Animation Studios. The pic takes place in a
supermarket that comes to life after hours. Hilary and Haylie Duff are among
those voicing the pic. Movie includes promotion-friendly characters such as
Mr. Clean, Charlie the Tuna and Twinkie the Kid. Kasanoff directs from a
screenplay by Brent Friedman, Rebecca Swanson and Sean Derek, based on a
story by Kasanoff and Joshua Wexler.
* Matthew Vaughn (LAYER CAKE) is set to direct X-MEN 3 for 20th Century Fox
and Marvel Entertainment. Hugh Jackman, who plays Wolverine, is set to
return. Ian McKellen, Halle Berry and Patrick Stewart are still in
negotiations. The project will begin filming in mid-July for release May 26,
2006, which marks the beginning of Memorial Day weekend.
* DreamWorks has purchased the comedy pitch OPPOSITE DAY by Nicholas
Stoller. Walter Parkes and Laurie MacDonald will produce. Project is about a
man who learns to appreciate his life when everything in it is suddenly the
opposite of what it normally is.
* Jose Rivera (THE MOTORCYCLE DIARIES) will adapt COMPOSITIONS IN BLACK AND
WHITE, the Kathryn Talalay book that's being developed as a star vehicle for
singer Alicia Keys, for Sony Pictures Entertainment. Marc Platt is producing
with Halle Berry and Vincent Cirrincione. Keys is attached to play Philippa
Schuyler, a woman who grew up a child prodigy, the first child of color to
become a nationally prominent musician. Schuyler was composing music by the
age of 5, but racial and gender bias prevalent in the 1930s proved a
crushing burden for her.
* Ben Affleck will direct his adaptation of Dennis Lehane's novel GONE,
BABY, GONE for Touchstone Pictures. Pic will shoot this fall in Boston, and
Affleck will not act in the pic. It's about a pair of private detectives in
a working-class Boston neighborhood who are hired to search for a kidnapped
4-year-old girl. Alan Ladd, Dan Rissner and Sean Bailey will produce.
* Paul W.S. Anderson will write and direct Paramount's DEATHRACE 3000, a
remake of the cult Roger Corman pic DEATHRACE 2000, for Corman, C/W and
Impact Pictures.
* Atlantic Streamline has acquired Thomas Thonson's dark comedy spec
ROCKWELL about a troubled teen who incites chaos while pursuing the car that
he believes will solve all his problems.
* Wych Kaosayananda (BALLISTIC: ECKS VS. SEVER) will write and direct ROUND
FIVE, a pic about an Asian-American who spends 20 years as a Buddhist monk
after accidentally killing a friend in a Thai kick-boxing bout. for producer
Barrie M. Osborne (LORD OF THE RINGS).
* Darren Lynn Bousman will direct SAW 2 for Twisted Pictures and Lions Gate.
Shooting begins May 2 in Toronto for a Halloween release. Bousman wrote the
screenplay, which he developed with Leigh Whannel, writer and co-star of the
original pic, and James Wan, the pic's director.
* Mark Helfrich is set to direct GOOD LUCK CHUCK for New Line Cinema. The
romantic comedy is about a man who breaks up with his longtime girlfriend
only to see her get engaged to the next guy she dates. The same pattern
occurs with his next girlfriend and continues to repeat. He finds himself
becoming a lucky charm for women who all want to date him, and a comedy of
errors ensues. Josh Stolberg scripted.
* John Lee Hancock will adapt and direct the revenge drama DEAD I WELL MAY
BE for Universal Pictures and Anonymous Content. Written by Adrian McKinty,
the book follows a street-savvy illegal immigrant from Ireland who lands a
job as an Irish mob enforcer in New York in the early 1990s.
* Ron Howard will direct THE SERPENT AND THE EAGLE for Paramount and Imagine
about the Spanish conquest of Mexico in 1520. Brian Helgeland will write a
new draft of the script on how the Spanish conqueror Hernando Cortez
plundered the Aztec nation aided by an Aztec princess-turned-slave.
* Michael Lembeck (THE SANTA CLAUSE 2, CONNIE AND CARLA) will direct Tim
Allen in THE SANTA CLAUSE 3 for Disney. Production will begin in November.
Ed Decter and John Strauss are writing the screenplay. In the newest
installment, Santa, aka Scott Calvin, struggles to keep his new family happy
while battling Jack Frost, who is trying to take over Christmas.
* George Hickenlooper will helm the coming-of-age thriller BLUE MOUNTAIN for
Carson Signature Films and Chapman Ventures. Story, set in a small Southern
town, concerns a stolen gun that may have been linked to the assassination
of Robert F. Kennedy. Pic's backdrop stems from the theory that RFK assassin
Sirhan Sirhan did not act alone. Script was penned by Darby Connor. Beaux
Carson, Heidi Levitt and Donald Zuckerman will produce.
* Ben Affleck and Neo Art & Logic partners Joel Soisson and Mike Leahy have
optioned Rick Carr's script DOES ANYBODY HERE REMEMBER WHEN HANZ GUBENSTEIN
INVENTED TIME TRAVEL? Sci-fi comedy was one of three final scripts under
consideration to be produced for the third season of "Project Greenlight."
The other losing finalist, WILDCARD by Marshal Moseley, was optioned by Wes
Craven through his Craven/Maddalena Films.
* Salvador "Chava" Cartas will direct Gussi Films' MOTOCROSS, starring Iran
Castillo, Daniel Martinez and Ximena Sarinana, about two brothers on their
way to Las Vegas to attend the U.S. Motocross Open. Gussi has also committed
to the next film by Jorge Ramirez-Suarez (RABBIT ON THE MOON) about five
families who wreck their apartments while searching for rumored treasure
hidden in the building. Gussi is expected to put up most of the budget.
* Wong Ching-Po (JIANG HU) will direct AH SOU, starring Annie Liu, Eric
Tsang (INFERNAL AFFAIR), Anthony Wong (GOLDEN CHICKEN II), Liu Ye and Simon
Yam for Filmko and Deepjoy Picture Corp. Lawrence Cheng will produce. Liu
will play a young woman who becomes a triad boss.
* M. Night Shyamalan will write and direct the fantasy thriller LADY IN THE
WATER for Warner Bros. Pictures. Blinding Edge Pictures will produce. The
story centers on the superintendent of an apartment building who finds a
rare type of sea nymph swimming in the apartment pool. The film will be shot
in Philadelphia beginning in August for a July 21, 2006, release.
* Larry Gross (WE DON'T LIVE HERE ANYMORE) will write THIEVES, an
Americanized version of LES VOLEURS, for Warner Independent Pictures and
Mission Entertainment. New version will be set in New Orleans but will
follow the original's theme of a black sheep son born into a family of
thieves, who becomes a cop.
MISCELLANEOUS PRODUCTION TIDBITS
* Hart Sharp Entertainment has optioned Edwin John Wintle's memoir BREAKFAST
WITH TIFFANY, which Miramax Books will publish in June. The memoir details a
journey from single, middle-aged gay New Yorker to overnight parent as the
guardian of his troubled 13-year-old niece, Tiffany.
* Warner Independent Pictures will jointly develop and produce with Plural
Entertainment and Origen Prods. Cinematografica a pic based on the
international bestseller THE QUEEN OF THE SOUTH (LA REINA DEL SUR) by Arturo
Perez-Reverte (ALATRISTE). It's a thriller about a young Mexican woman who
flees from the killers of her drug-smuggling boyfriend. She gets involved in
the smuggling trade between Spain and Morocco, where she becomes a legend.
Andale Pictures is also attached to produce the film.
* Warner Bros. Pictures has closed a deal with NeoPets to make CGI-animated
features using 50 different pet species from the kids Web site. Dylan
Sellers will produce the films with NeoPets chairman-CEO Doug Dohring.
Created in 1991, NeoPets has a global following of about 25 million members
who log on regularly to create and care for their own
virtual pets, follow storylines about the pets that populate Neopia and pit
their virtual NeoPets against those of other Web site users.
* Film Finance Corp. (FFC) has greenlit a few projects including
writer/director Jonathan Ogilvie's THE TENDER HOOK, a film noir set in 1920s
Sydney, toplining Radha Mitchell, Ray Winstone and Matt Le Nevez; Richard
Frankland penned the script and makes his feature helming debut on TO HELL
AND BOURKE, a road movie featuring two Aborigines, an Italian rock star, a
possessed dog, a transvestite and sensitive new-age cops; and Michael James
Rowland will write and direct LUCKY MILES, the saga of three mismatched
companions stranded in the Oz desert.
GUNN SHOTS
(NOT from the trades)
* Susnet 5's DALLAS 362 will screen on May 6. It stars Scott Caan (who also
wrote and directed), Sean Hatosy, Jeff Goldblum, Kelly Lynch and Val Lauren
in a breakout performance. It's a buddy movie combining humor and drama
centering on a couple of roughnecks facing life-altering decisions. Check
out http://dallas362.net for more info.
* Highly acclaimed short horror film THE SILVERGLEAM WHISTLE will screen
Saturday April 2 at 1:30pm with the feature MALEVOLENCE as part of the
Fearless Tales Film Festival in San Francisco. For more info on the
screening please visit http://www.fearlesstales.com. For info on THE
SILVERGLEAM WHISTLE and Mike Williamson, including other upcoming
screenings, please visit http://www.nickeleyepictures.com
* HARVEY RICHARDS: LAWYER FOR CHILDREN, one of Ruben Bolling's delightfully
absurd characters from the alternative comic strip TOM THE DANCING BUG, has
been optioned by New Line Cinema for a feature film, Bolling and Universal
Press Syndicate announced today. Visit
http://www.amuniversal.com/ups/newsrelease/?view=188 for more.
* The first image of Energy Unlimited's THE WALL OF THE CROW hits the net at
http://www.thewallofthecrow.com/
* RULE NUMBER ONE, written and directed by David Presley (FACE OF THE ENEMY
short) has officially wrapped post production. The comedy short stars rising
actress Danielle Panabaker (EMPIRE FALLS, SKY HIGH) as a student whose
mother warns her about "rule number one," that high school boys only want
one thing. Panabaker's character sets out on a quest to prove mom wrong.
If you have a movie to promote, a screening to push, movie gossip missed by
the trades, fire a **one-paragraph, 50 words-or-less** GUNN SHOT to
elstongunn@hotmail.com. If it's not **one paragraph, 50 words-or-less,**
it'll be tossed. Sorry.
Until next week... Happy April Fool's Day!
Elston Gunn
elstongunn@hotmail.com
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